HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: jeffw@or.credence.com (Jeff Winslow)
Subject: Re: tonality and modern music
Organization: Credence Systems Corp. Beaverton, OR
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 00:21:07 GMT

In article <x#w1+yc@rpi.edu> mccomt@aix.rpi.edu (Todd Michel McComb) writes:

[very many true and wonderful things]

>       There is also an explosion of musical experiences available from
>all over the world: from India, Indonesia, China and the Middle East.  These
>powerful and varied traditions are to me the most damaging evidence against
>assigning any priority to the "traditional" tonal idiom.  Clearly, these
>cultures have produced and are producing direct and powerful music in an
>"atonal" idiom. 

This is the only thing I really balk at. Certainly no other culture's
traditional music is based on what we call "functional harmony", but
I would be very surprised to find music from a non-western tradition
which neither a) has a pitch center, or b) doesn't use some (probably
unequal-tempered) version or subset of a diatonic scale. 

I'm not trying to prove a point here; I'd be damn tickled if someone
pointed out some examples. I've just never heard of them. As a result I
don't believe there's anything out there that most western listeners
would classify as "atonal" music.


And in other news, try this on for size. My latest piece - which is
tonal even though it ends a half tone below where it begins - is in
two roughly equal parts, one a varied repeat of the other. I was
reviewing what I have finished the other day, and realized that the top
line leading into the join between the two, which was developed purely
to lead into a key arrival, and the top line leading away from it, which
I thought of months ago before I even knew how I was going to build anything
in the rest of the piece, together make a twelve tone row. Not only that,
but an intuitive detail which I had thought of early in the "joining"
process, but which I threw out later because it didn't sound right for some
reason, would have been the only repeated note in the row, that is, the 
only note that would have prevented it from being a row. Put that in your
pipe and smoke it.

I'm not sure what the fact that the note is the dominant of the eventual
real key arrival (not the arrival that seems at first to occur) has to do
with it. You'd think something like that would be desirable, but it wasn't.

						Jeff Winslow
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: conrad@brahms.udel.edu (Jon Conrad)
Subject: Re: tonality and modern music
Organization: University of Delaware
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1992 14:49:18 GMT

In article <1eh92dINNit1@calvin.usc.edu> alves@calvin.usc.edu (William Alves) writes:

>...consider this: there are plenty of
>dissonant pieces that are great audience pleasers. Heck, the amount of
>dissonance in a piece by Bach is truly astonishing for those who haven't
>really analyzed the note-to-note counterpoint. Thus when people say they
>don't like something because it's "dissonant," I am suspicious.

Rightly so, but we have a different take on Why.  I think you have made
the mistake of assuming that most people at a concert actually *listen* 
to music, much as I admire your reasoning.

>I think that the difference between the dissonance in Bach and Schoenberg
>is not so much quantitative as we tend to assume, but rather that people
>more easily hear the logic, the processes, and the composer's voice in the
>music of Bach. 

And I think it's because people see the name Schoenberg, know he's
"Modern," and "know" that they hate it.  Before hearing it.

>Likewise, there's plenty of melody in Stockhausen, for example, so why do
>people accuse his music of having "no melody"? 

Because they don't listen to it, they just go by the label.

I've seen people stream out of a subscription concert when the Seven
Early Songs of Berg began.  Now, for anyone who doesn't know these, they
are short, voluptuous, pure romantic outpourings, in the same world as
Richard Strauss, say, or early Mahler.  But these folks had seen the
label "Berg" in the program and knew they "didn't like that awful
dissonant modern music."

Now, I don't claim that this is the whole story of why people dislike
these pieces; there is something in what you say, and maybe other
explanations too.  But there's an awful lot of prejudging too.

Jon Alan Conrad
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: conrad@brahms.udel.edu (Jon Conrad)
Subject: Wagnerian singing (was Re: Tannhauser)
Keywords: Wagner, Tannhauser, Melchior, Szell, Konwitchny
Organization: University of Delaware
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 22:33:40 GMT

In article <By6vK6.IwG@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu> smitra@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (Sami Mitra) writes:

>The Sinopoli recording, like all Tannhausers, has its good and not-so-good
>points. Cheryl Studer is in awesome voice througout. Placido Domingo, as
>always, sings very well, never strained to produce ugly sounds and 
>always soaring above the orchestra. This sound is very pleasant to the
>ear, but, how shall I put it, I find his certain lack of "gruffness"
>a bit disconcerting. 

Really?  You *prefer* the gruffness??  By which you mean, I guess,
harshness?  Or what *do* you mean?

>Maybe he is too "unGermanic"...there I go cliche-ing again. 

Yeah, I am really not sure what you mean.  Obviously his German
pronunciation is, shall we say, "odd."  But I'll definitely take the
trade-off to hear the parts actually sung well for once.  There's
nothing inherently "unGermanic" about beautiful singing!

>But listen to his beautifully sung lines at the beginning
>of the 2nd act, "die fursten...". And then listen to someone like Max
>Lorenz in his excerpt in the EMI compilation of the 20's and 30's Wagnerian
>singing, the latter is more strained and all but you'll see what I mean.

Actually, I don't.  Lorenz is indeed more strained.  He always was.  You
prefer that?  Or there's something else (what?) that he has, that
Domingo doesn't?  Myself, I'm all in favor of the beautifully sung
lines.

Lorenz was not a top-rank tenor as far as I'm concerned anyway.  Try
Melchior, the only truly great Wagnerian tenor we've had on records
(along with Jacques Urlus and possibly Vickers in some roles).  He is
equally unstrained and liquid and beautiful.  That is the way the music
*should* sound!

>Incidentally, this aspect of Domingo's not getting into the skin aspect
>bothers me somewhat more in the recent release of Die Frau Ohne Schatten
>with Solti. I wonder if he will affect me same way in his soon to be 
>released Parsifal, especially in the 2nd act! 

More than likely.  He was criticized for this in his live performances.
Luckily a Parsifal can get away with it more, as he has essentially one
attitude in Acts 1 and 3, and Act 2 is so subtle that if you just act
like you know what you're doing, you're ahead of the audience.

>It is a pity that most of the male tenors in todays world of Wagnerian
>singing don't embody characterization and good singing equally well.
>I think that among the major singers Siegfried Jerusalem comes 
>closest.

And his best example of this is that amazing Gurrelieder with Chailly.
Peter Hofmann actually had the gifts to do this, I think.  But he never
really got his (potentially impressive) voice working reliably, and he
never really worked hard enough.  Rene Kollo had a few good outings -- I
recommend his first Meistersinger and his young Siegfried with Janowski.
(His second Meistersinger and his Emperor are impressively
characterized, but in those the singing is hard to take.)

Jon Alan Conrad
From: ronthal-adam@yale.edu (Adam Ronthal)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: Considering 4'33''
Date: 17 Nov 1992 19:18:44 -0500
Organization: Yale University Science & Engineering UNIX(tm), New Haven, CT 06520-2158
NNTP-Posting-Host: minerva.cis.yale.edu

In article <JIM.92Nov17131425@fuji.eng.yale.edu> jim@fuji.eng.yale.edu (James J. Szinger) writes:

[Stuff deleted]
>Let me ask you a question: Would you rather listen
>to a piece (you choice) by Cage, or an ad lib 3rd Horn solo in
>Apollo?
>

Frankly, Jim, I'd rather not have to listen to either.

>To the rest of you, please not that Mr. Ronthal does not speak
>for anyone other than himself.

I never claimed to Jim, I assume that when most people post, they write
their _own_ opinions.


>opinions with those of the University or the League.  His only
>claim to fame if that his girlfriend is a 2nd trombone.

What does that have to do with it?   I'm a fourth horn.

>
>As for myself, I like to think I have an open mind.  I believe

I do have an open mind.  I listen to the stuff, maybe even more than
once, and then I decide if I like it or not.  Perhaps I was a bit harsh
on cage, but I really don't like what I've heard, and I honestly don't
think he had much musical talent at all. 

>that Cage was an artist but am unsure if he was a musician.

Sure he was an artist, just not a very good one, that's all. 

>
>Jim
>--
>James Szinger                        jim@fuji.eng.yale.edu

Adam


-- 
   /|\  /|~\   Adam M. Ronthal BR'94    |    ronthal-adam@yale.edu	
  /-| \/ |_/   P.O. Box 607 Yale Stn.   |    ronthal@minerva.cis.yale.edu
 /  |    | \   New Haven, CT   06520    |    ronthal@pop.cis.yale.edu
From: gcastlem@mipos2.intel.com (Glenn Castleman)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Classical Alan Parsons...
Date: 23 Nov 92 21:46:21 GMT
Organization: Intel Corporation, Santa Clara, CA

!@#$%^&!@#$%^&!@#$%^&!@#$%^&!@#$%^&!@#$%^&!@#$%^&!@#$%^&!@#$%^&!@#$%^&!@#$%^&
@                      | The test of a first rate intelligence is the       ^
# Glenn C. Castleman   | ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at       %
$                      | the same time and still retain the ability to      $
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: johnme@ecs.comm.mot.com (John Meyer)
Subject: Re: Rachmaninoff's cello or 2nd?
Organization: pcb_design
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 12:15:18 GMT

In article <1992Nov18.162919.61014@cc.usu.edu> slj1k@cc.usu.edu writes:
>In article <BxxGoz.884.1@cs.cmu.edu>, acid+@cs.cmu.edu (Christopher Colby) writes:
>> In article <1992Nov17.222353.60974@cc.usu.edu> slj1k@cc.usu.edu writes:
>>>I'm torn between purshasing a Rachmaninoff CD containing his 2nd Symphony and
>>>the Vocalise, and one with his cello sonatas with the Volcalise.
>>>
>>>Any suggestions (and please don't say both, I'm poor)
>> 
>> Oh, you're far more hip if you go with the cello sonatas.
>> 
>> -chris
>> 
>> P.S.: Seriously, which recordings are these?
>
>	I just had time to look at the labels (I know, a hell of a basis),
>	and the 2nd Symphony appeared on the 1992 TELARC release.  The cello
>	concertos were on PHILIPS' Digital Classics, which included some
>	Dvorak cello and piano concerto, didn't see a year...but I'm leaning
>	toward the TELARC, they've never disappointed yet regardless of the
>	talent, which I'm sure will be amazing.
>

The TELARC of the 2nd sym. is rated on top in the stevenson guide,only Fanfare gave it bad
  marks on performance.And we all know Fanfare is not bias NOT!

  john
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: pugh@pico.math.ucla.edu (David Pugh)
Subject: Re: Re: representative classical list
Organization: UCLA Mathematics Department
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 92 17:40:35 GMT

In article <0a5euB4w165w@student.business.uwo.ca> r4smith@student.business.uwo.ca (Richard Smith) writes:
>I didn't say to dump the Reich (don't actually know this piece, he says 
>with some embarrassment), but I think that to go from the Berg Violin 
>Concerto to Steve Reich skips most of the important developments in the 
>mid-twentieth century.
>
Oh okay, I misunderstood. If you like minimalism at all, then Reich's Desert
Music (imho) is a great piece. Thing is it really isn't all that minimalist!
I find it a very exciting piece, full of 12/8 rhythms and counterpoint
and all the usual Reich tricks. Very stirring choral writing too.

Another Reich piece which I think listeners should look out for is
called 'Different Trains'. To me this is the most moving piece I have
heard in the last 10-15 years. Anyone else heard this piece?

>About the Berg. Great piece, no question. But is the representative of 
>twelve-tone music. No way--it's an anomaly. Berg was a marvelous composer 
>but not as influential as Webern
>
Well although Schoenberg and Berg used the 12-tone system I never really
thought of them as breaking away from tonality the way Webern did. Many
musicologists say (and I agree) that Webern was the true revolutionary.

As you indicate, most of the music from say 1940 (Boulez, Stockhausen,
Varese, etc,etc) was influenced by Webern.

--
|-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-|
   David Pugh,  UCLA,  CA         |     Hot Dog, Jumping Frog
   pugh@math.ucla.edu             |     Albuquerque  -  Prefab Sprout
|-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-|
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: JEFFS@UMRVMB.umr.edu
Subject: Verdi's Rigoletto
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 19:52:14 GMT
Organization: Univ of MO - Rolla

I've decided I can't live much longer without a recording of Rigoletto.
Any recommendations re: recorded performances?

Jeff
jeffs@umrvmb.umr.edu
From: diarmuid@uniwa.uwa.edu.au (Diarmuid Pigott)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Malipiero
Date: 16 Nov 1992 12:06:35 +0800
Organization: The University of Western Australia
NNTP-Posting-Host: uniwa.uwa.edu.au
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL5


I have just obtained the ASV CD of the Malipiero String Quartets, played
by the Orpheus String Quartet. 

It is wonderful music - quartets using the forms of Italian Lyric
Poetry, as evinced by the titals - "Rispetti e strambotti", "Stornelli e
ballate", "Cantari alla madrigalesca", "Dei capricci".

The music is fresh and exciting, and the first quartet "R e S" (1920)
is particularly recommended to those who, like the composer (and your
correspondent) , adore the sound of open strings on fiddles.

Does anyone in NetLand know if his symphonies have been recorded? Any
other works? Any contributions gratefully accepted (wipes harmonica on
sleeve, and hobbles away into the shadows).
From: alves@calvin.usc.edu (William Alves)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: Marc Blitzstein
Date: 16 Nov 1992 10:22:52 -0800
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
NNTP-Posting-Host: calvin.usc.edu

In article <hal.27.721926075@radio.wkar.msu.edu> hal@radio.wkar.msu.edu (Hal Prentice) writes:

>Blitzstein died in 1964 as a result of a beating at the hands of some US 
>Sailors in Martinique.  Blitzstein was gay and that is the supposed 
>provocation for the violence done to him.

This is true, but while in the hospital, he requested that the cause of
death be listed as an automobile accident because of the scandal. As a
result, there are a number of reputable reference works that still list
this as the cause of death. There is a similar story about Webern's death,
about which his family spread false stories to protect the family name
from the scandal of Webern's son-in-law who was involved in the black
market. Webern was shot when he stumbled on his son-in-law's arrest in a
dark corridor by a trigger-happy and frightened cook in the U.S. Army.

Bill Alves
From: hellerS@moravian.edu (sjh)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: Turangalila Symphony
Date: 22 Nov 92 02:07:18 GMT
Distribution: na

In <D7ekuB4w165w@student.business.uwo.ca> r4smith@student.business.uwo.ca (Richard Smith) writes:

>Does anyone share my impression of "Joie du Sang des Etoiles" as a 
>country hoedown gone mad? I love the piece but I think of Aaron Copland + 
>Ondes Martenot.

Yes, this is a dance of joy if ever there ever was one. There are few
pieces of music that achieve the thrilling energy to this mvement. A couple
other gleeful moments of Messiaen are the last movement of Turangalila and
the 2nd movement of 3 Petites Liturgies, not to mention Regard de l'Esprit
de joie from Vingt Regards. When Olie was happy he was delerious!
From: velde2@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu (Velde Francois)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: Bernard Shaw quotes (was: Brahms)
Date: 16 Nov 92 13:49:37 GMT
Organization: HAC - Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore

In article <basinski-131192175452@lully.biosci.arizona.edu> basinski@biosci.arizona.edu (Mark Basinski) writes:
>
> The "Wagner's music is not as bad as it sounds" is indeed one of Mark
>Twain's
>pithy comments about his experiences at Bayreuth. Another of his comments
>(my favorite) about Der Ring :
>
>"There were many lovely moments. There were also many tedious quarter
>hours."

I thought this was Rossini, and the original in French was: " il y a de
beaux moments, mais aussi de mauvais quarts d'heure." Didn't we have a 
thread on this a few months ago?

-- 

	Francois Velde
From: diarmuid@uniwa.uwa.edu.au (Diarmuid Pigott)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: Brahms violin concerto (summary)
Date: 20 Nov 1992 17:57:18 +0800
Organization: The University of Western Australia
NNTP-Posting-Host: uniwa.uwa.edu.au
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL5

I knew the pieces on clean vimyl recordings long before I hear the
Neveu. I knew Neveu from salon pieces like the Scartalescu, but that was
all.

I walked in to the Gramophone Shop in Perth when the owner was playing
the finale of the Sibelius and it took my breath away. I went and bought
it immediately, something I'm not usually prone to doing (there were
other people in the store who were moving towrads the counter as well).
He sold the two he had, and ordered another 4.

IMHO I fervently suggest that it would be worth putting up with the
noises to hear the music. By the time she's finished with the concerti,
I'm surprised the violin's in one piece.

Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: velde2@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu (Francois Velde)
Subject: Re: The worst composer ever
Organization: HAC - Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 22:14:32 GMT

In article <1992Nov23.190700.18251@alex.com> jon@alex.com (Jonathan Heitler) writes:
>In article <g8FkuB7w165w@student.business.uwo.ca>, r4smith@student.business.uwo.ca (Richard Smith) writes:
>|> It's a poll--who do you think is the worst famous composer of them all?
>|> 
>
>Identifying worst composers is the same as trying to find your worst
>poet or collecting really hideous things. As soon as you start really
>looking at things that are consistently horrible, you start to love them.
>People quote there least favourite things all the time and look on their
>collections of monstrosities with tenderness.

I don't think I'll ever grow fond of my nomination, Tchaikovsky, the
apotheosis of kitsch.

-- 

	Francois Velde
From: mgresham@dscatl.UUCP (Mark Gresham)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: tonality and modern music
Date: 23 Nov 92 01:11:27 GMT
Reply-To: mgresham@dscatl.UUCP (Mark Gresham)
Organization: Digital Systems Co,  Atlanta, Ga

In article <lgr2teINNia0@exodus.Eng.Sun.COM> jamesc@bassclar.Eng.Sun.COM writes:
}Jack Campin, jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk, writes:
}>Have you actually *heard* much of Stockhausen?  Case in point: "Stimmung"
}>(which is about as tonal as music can possibly get).  If you can listen
}>to that all the way through and *not* have the urge to sing that little
}>"oo-ee-oo-ee-oo-ee-Yahweh" bit in the bath for the next week I would be
}>very surprised.
}
}About the only music MORE tonal than "Stimmung" would be some bare drone 
}pieces by LaMonte Young!

Or "Spiral Mandala" by Pauline Oliveros.  (For which I played one
of the 8 crystal glasses several years back in an Atlanta
performance.)  ...although none of these are 'tonal' in the
Piston Harmony sense, of course (but then, neither is much
early music, either).



Cheers,

--Mark Gresham

dscatl!mgresham@gatech.edu

==========================
From: wyf307@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Freeman Yu-Feng Wei)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Song Recital
Date: 23 Nov 92 07:44:25 GMT
Reply-To: wyf307@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Freeman Yu-Feng Wei)
Distribution: austin
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX
Originator: wyf307@mickey.cc.utexas.edu

*******************************************************************************

                     You are cordially invited to
                            A Song Recital
                                 by
                         Su Sun Wong, Soprano
                       Darryl Hobson-Byrd, Piano
                        Victoria Beatty, Flute
                                 on
                     Monday, November 30, 1992, 8pm
                                 at
                    Jessen Auditorium, U.T. at Austin
               (located on 21st Street, opposite Dobie Mall)
 
               ADMISSION FREE -- EVERYONE IS WELCOME :) :) :)
 
              //ps> Songs sung in French, German, Chinese, Russian
                    Italian, and English.

*******************************************************************************
From: al@sys6626.bison.mb.ca (haus der luge)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Considering 4'33''
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 92 09:29:31 CST
Organization: System 6626 BBS, Winnipeg Manitoba Canada

 
I believe that 4'33'' was intended to have several functions.
 
The primary motive behind the piece was to 'frame' a period of time in 
which the listener may become aware of outside sounds.  It is impossible 
for a person who is capable of hearing to escape from the realm of sound. 
Cage himself tried to do this by entering an anechoic chamber and was 
rather startled to find that he could still hear two different pitches, 
one low and one high.  A technician at the chamber explained to him that 
he was hearing his circulatory and nervous system at work.  Cage tried to 
open us to all sounds around us.  Outside of the anechoic chamber, there 
exists a multitude of sounds we are not normally aware of.  Cage 
explained that "My favorite music is the one we hear all the time if we 
are quiet".
 
4'33'' also makes us aware of several other factors.  Firstly, we become 
aware that ANY piece of music which employs quiet passages also involved 
outside noise if we allow ourselves to be aware of it.  Since the outside 
world contains an always changing soundscape, the implication of this 
fact is that all performances of any given piece contain sounds both 
intentional and non-intentional - therefore each performance is slightly 
different in nature.  No musical experience can twice give us the exact 
same aural sensation.  What 4'33'' did was to allow equal status to 
outside sounds as to intentionally produced sounds.  I believe that 
4'33'' has redefined how we think about aural art and the potentially 
enjoyable sonorities produced unintentionally and constantly around us.
 
A few footnotes - the first transcription of 4'33'' contained a vertical 
line on which the performer was to trace his or her performance.  
Following editions contained a simple tacet figure, which I think is 
somewhat inferior.  Cage also later decided that the piece should not be 
broken into specifically lengthed movements as had been done in David 
Tudor's first performance of 1952.  Cage felt that interpretation of the 
piece should be entirely free.  Both of these factors have been 
misunderstood in previous conversation.
 
I think it would follow that perhaps the best performance of 4'33'' would 
be one in which the disciplined listener also performs it by themself.  
In this manner, the main functions of the piece can be best achieved.
 
HausDerLuge
 
PS:  I have a wonderful picture of Cage performing 4'33'' on the wall of 
my studio.  This was a performance in Cologne, where Cage performed the 
piece at a table with a huge banner that contained scrawled German swear 
words hanging behind him.  A definite inspiration device.
 
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical