Do you have prejudices regarding any composer?

SweetJesus said:

I can't stand Tchaikovsky since the very beginning. Too Disney-ish for me most of the time. So I kind of look somewhere else whenever our paths cross. I know it's bad and all of that, but I am sure some of you have the same unavoidable feeling about some other composers. :devil:

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It's fascinating that Tchaikovsky is "too Disney-ish", considering the composer died a full eight years before Walter Elias Disney was born. Perhaps if you contended that Disney was too Tchaikovsky-ish, your prejudice would gain greater validity. But Disney was less a composer than a cartoonist, and Tchaikovsky much more a composer than ever a cartoonist. I would also contend that Tchaikovsky was much more of a composer than ever was Disney as a cartoonist. But this is rather like comparing apples and oranges, or Russian ballet and mice.
Which might reveal a prejudice I have for a certain Russian composer.
Few composers move my heart in the way Tchaikovsky can. The Sixth Symphony (seeming to me a rewriting of Beethoven's triumphal Fifth) remains as stunning a portrait about wrestling with destiny, a destiny which crushes the protagonist and leaves him shattered and devastated, as was ever devised in art. It plumbs emotional heights and depths which Disney, at his most creative, could only glance at.
Yet, this same composer gave us the joyous Nutcracker and the Capriccio Italien, two phenomenal piano concerti and a to-die-for violin concerto. If I find any shortcomings in Tchaikovsky's work, I rather chalk them up to my own lack of understanding. My prejudice for Pyotr Ilyich includes giving him the benefit of the doubt.

If I have prejudices towards the negative concerning music -- that is, prejudices towards music I don't like, I would name rap, hip-hop, and much minimalism. But I'm not so closed minded to not be prepared to listen to fostering arguments for these genres as music, should there be one out there who can eloquently make the case. I'm all ears.

Woodduck said:

I'm really at a loss as to what you're up to here. Your post and the preceding one by SONNET CLV prompted me to look back over this thread in search of that "surprising number" of posts he cites as "downing" contemporary music. The only thing that surprised me - no, it actually didn't - is that actual negative comments about contemporary music are few and far between.

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Please, Woodduck. I know you are much more astute than to purposely misquote me, and to thus lead others to a possible misunderstanding of my words. Here is what I said:

I just finished reading through this thread and am surprised by the number of posts "downing" on modern/contemporary composers and their music.

Certainly, "to be surprised by the number" (which can refer to a low number) and a "surprising number" (which may imply a large number) do not necessarily correlate.

Of course, they can correlate, too. But unless one knows for sure what another means by his surprise at a number, one should hold off judgments about the other. Such premature judging may be construed as a prejudice.

Unless that's what you had in mind in this thread concerning prejudices?

By the way, yesterday I also ordered the DUX set of Complete Symphonies by Penderecki and am looking forward to hearing them. (I already have the symphonies on assorted other labels, but the DUX set seems promising.)

As for Telemann ... a short while back I pulled in the 29-disc Telemann Edition Box set from Brilliant Classics and have been enjoying the recordings.

Rather than pine about music of this or that era, I prefer listening to it.