Because he has superimposed an abstract and ridiculous philosophy on all of music to make up for lack of talent, ability and inspiration. And because somewhere during all of this he came to be backed by big money from somewhere, so now his idea, however revolting, has a platform.

As long as we're quoting movies, Mr. Hill, how about this one:

Main character: It's a sin! IT'S A SIN!!

Supporting character: What's all this about sin?

Main character: If you can do that to Beethoven, you can do that to ANYBODY!!
(skipping ahead)-
Supporting character: I suppose this may be where punishment comes in. Gov'nor ought to be pleased...

Clockwork Orange, Malcolm McDowell as Alex.

Oh, yeah! Once again, let's hear it for Kubrick.
Now... about that poem: the writer is 1) English, 2) 19th Century, and 3) has spouse almost as famous as he is (well, that last one narrows it down to two!)

speaking of clockwork orange, i wonder what Alex's response would be, had he listened to Cobra's interpretation.

This guy could learn a few lessons from that leather coat conductor someone showed us a little while back.

O.K.: Time's up (or, it could be that there are those who aren't worked up enough to care). That's okay... let me just say, for the sake of "squaring-the-circle," if nothing else--

Re: post 5... "Soliliquy of the Spanish Cloister": Robert Browning.

Before or after the therapy?

I heard the second movement, and went cold inside. Lucky it's hot outside.

HAHAHA!! This is so absurd it's actually amusing. I listened to ahem! parts of the Ninth..( I couldn't stomach the whole thing)..And some of his other attempts as well..

I am surprised that the performers could actually keep a straight face throughout the, what seems like three hours this went on for!!!...

I'm sure they had to go out for several toilet breaks during rehearsals!!

It's the art of how to completely ruin culture...

All I can say is Maximianno "What a Load of COBRAS!"

I'm sure Cobra can conduct Beethoven (after watching a rather "normal" earlier video of him conducting 7th). Maybe he had a fit of madness, but that's what classical music has come to today. Some people think they are making something "new" and "revolutionary", but not knowing what they are doing is pretty much being done already, and pretty idiotic really.

I share the same view in relation to a fair amount of contemporary compositions.

Hi There. What do you mean by this? Do you think that Classical music has "shot it's bolt"? Do you think that music can go into new directions or have we exhausted all possible ways of expressing music?(Pop, Jazz, etc. included) Can the popularity and influence of the "old" masters be ever reproduced or has Western art Music been banished to the very back row for ever?
(Maybe I am starting a new thread with this idea!!)

Originaly, changing trends in music was like evolution, it happend naturally and over time. In the modern era, people are trying to be different, just to be different. Mozart for example, was different - but he was only different in so much as he thought it wouldimprove music. A lot of music these days, will be laughed at by the majority of the people in the western world.

As far as music trends, today (in pop) I hear a lot of bands going back to the style of the 60s. I don't think that Classical music is dead, I just think we have skipped far too much due to the need to be strikingly different. There are a lot of possible styles in between Wagner and Stravinsky that have not been explored.

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Interesting comments,

I would have thought that the era between Wagner and Stravinsky was quite well covered by a raft of composers with different styles and national flavours, (Debussy, Faure, Sibelius, Nielsen, Elgar, Vaughn Williams, Ives, Mahler and Rachmaninov to name but a few).

My observations are that the outset of pop music is a result of tonal breakdown in art music and most people want a good tune to hear and sing to and rarely get it in twentieth century art music..It's just far too inaccessible..

They are all still, rather large jumps in difference. Compare the differences between Mozart and Haydn, Bach and Handel; they aren't huge.

The tradition if trying to be different really started as early back as Beethoven; after all, what was is 3rd symphony about?

Strauss is one of the composers who did retrospectively fill the blank, his operatic style is not that dissimilar to Wagner and one would be excused if you mixed the two up (on some occasions).

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