I can't tell if this is a joke or not

 

I think it is earnest, but then it is a sort of inadvertent joke, the butt of which is better not named

 

I am glad that you is currently on a youth symphony orchestra. I hope that a few more years will give you at least some politeness so you can better express your discontentment!

 

Ok, I really have to get this out.

We were in music history class today, and we talked about composers from 1870ish-1930ish. I have a huge list of composers that I honestly can't stand. And it's big.

I have to start off by saying that most of the avant-grade composers are just horrible. Horrible, horrible, horrible.

---

I'm the new principal bassoonist (promotion! ) of a youth symphony orchestra... but I have to say that Stravinsky is a crazy a$$ b1***. Let's start off with the Rite of Spring. Why the heck is it so high? Weirdest rhythms ever! Atonality! Never really follows the key signature!

Next up has to be Ives. I honestly think that his main purpose was to **** off the people who were forced to play his pieces by making them subdivide triplets within triplets within triplets... with notes that don't even match.

My biggest pet peeve has to be Schoenberg. Atonality is honestly the worst thing that has happened to the world of music. I'm guessing that he got bored and splattered ink on a piece of paper, added flats and sharps, and VOILA, YOU HAVE "MUSIC".

Anything minimalistic/expressionist is horrible too. If I ever go to a performance of John Cage's 4'33", I'll honestly spark a riot. Philip Glass's music is ear torture.

If people are gonna make new music, then why not make it sound good?

What do you like?

 

Pabst Blue Ribbon.

 

I'm a really huge fan of Romantic and Classical. Up the melodies and themes and the climaxes call really get to me; they're the reason that I'm a huge fan of classical music. When I was like 10 I thought that classical music was rubbish and that trashy hip-hop was the way to go, and I only realized how pretty everything was and how genius the composers were by pouring their feelings into music like Russia's triumph in the 1812 Overture. It's all pretty to me.

 

Your taste in Classical is quite conservative and there's nothing wrong with that. That you gave up on 'trashy hip-hop' is a victory in of itself considering how young you probably are.

 

When I learned of the avant-garde ways of the "new" composers, it made me very angry. I felt like they were spoiling what music was. I mean, it still fits the definition of "sound organized in time", but I honestly thought it was folly and was made fun of real music like "It's Gon Rain" (a loop of a pastor screaming about armageddon).

 

From the same composer:

-New York Counterpoint

-Variations for Vibes, Pianos & Strings

I would rather listen to those pieces instead of the 1812 Overture to be honest.

 

So, read any good books lately? See any good movies? Any of that made after 1890?

Ha, haaaa, haaaaaa, haaaaaaaaa.

 

I'm seventeen and don't really understand much twentieth century music. I think it just takes time to find the meaning. But I do agree that it can be very frustrating listening to music that I can't connect with in any way. I would say never expect to understand a piece of music until you've listened to it at least ten times.

 

I never reacted quite the way you do to modern music, but there was a time when I did not like any Stravinsky, I thought Ives was a bit scary, and Schoenberg sounded like random pitches. I generally liked some of Glass's works even from the beginning.

Now I truly love some of Stravinsky's works (The Rite, Violin Concerto, Dumbarton Oaks Concerto, Symphony of Psalms...), think Ives has some great works (symphonies, Central park in the Dark), and love several of Schoenberg's works (Verklarte Nacht, Chamber Symphony 1 and 2, Quartets 1 and 3).

You may never like any of those composers, but many people were in a very similar place to where you are now. Some of them have just listened to a lot of new music and eventually found that they came to appreciate it.

 

You're in for a lifetime of torment if every punch that falls well short of the end of your nose is going to cause such indignation...and I say bollocks to your assessment of Le Sacre du Printemps; not only was it a remarkably courageous, visionary, and profound challenge to staid convention, but it's avant-garde construction of dissonance, metre, tonality, and rhythm create an inimitable portrait of - or better yet, journey through - Spring's cyclical power of growth, rebirth, renewal, and redemption, yet also the inevitable sacrifice and decay that texture our glorious, short-lived corporeal existence. /kat

 

How provocative and upsetting this OP is... *yawn*

seriously now: this is the same person logging in under four or five usernames, isn't it?

 

One Bassoonist to Another

As a sixty-seven year old bassoonist I can tell you I did not get atonal music until I was in my fifties.

As far as the Right of Spring is concerned, with your attitude if you want to be a pro forget it. The Stadio contains most of the standard bassoon excerpts that all bassoonist must know, including The Right. It is missing a few like the Sorcerer's Apprentice. All bassoonists in every symphony orchestra is expected to know how to play The Right of Spring. If you have aspirations of being a pro, get use to having to play what you hate. I have lost track of all of the garbage I have had to play in my life.

 

As a sixty-seven year old bassoonist I can tell you I did not get atonal music until I was in my fifties.

As far as the Right of Spring is concerned, with your attitude if you want to be a pro forget it. The Stadio contains most of the standard bassoon excerpts that all bassoonist must know, including The Right. It is missing a few like the Sorcerer's Apprentice. All bassoonists in every symphony orchestra is expected to know how to play The Right of Spring. If you have aspirations of being a pro, get use to having to play what you hate. I have lost track of all of the garbage I have had to play in my life.

I am no bassoonist but that makes sense in terms of what I've read about the piece. When Stravinsky composed it, The Rite of Spring was very difficult to play for even the finest orchestras, and the bassoon solo at the beginning was seen to be hell by the players. I read an article about this last year, during the hundredth anniversary of the piece. Stravinsky's revision made the piece easier to play (if my memory serves me correctly?) but most orchestras today play the original version. Simon Rattle said in the article that all orchestras that are world class have to be able to cut their teeth on that work, otherwise they just don't cut the mustard.

In a broader sense, yes Modern era and contemporary music can be extremely difficult to play. This is perhaps why even the finest scores of the post-1945 period - such as by Elliott Carter - are rarely played by the world's symphony orchestras. These tend to chew up too much rehearsal time, basically. Even Carter acknowledged this in an interview, and said that was the partly the reason he was so highly prolific in chamber music. Chamber groups had lower budgets due to less personnel, basically. So they could play his pieces with less overheads than orchestras. With living and recently departed composers, payment of royalties can also be prohibitive, but that's another issue not related to this thread.

So I can see how these scores can be extremely daunting to players, not only beginners but pros. Of course not only 20th century music is complex, but in some respects in the 20th century you had composers out-doing eachother in complexity, constantly raising the bar of what was playable. This is a good reason why electronic music came in, to play music that couldn't be played by humans. Once composers can push boundaries beyond certain limits, they'll keep pushing. Question is whether it is necessary or feasible. Another question is are they doing it to impress eachother? Sometimes I wonder.

I suppose there is no set answer to those types of questions, but even composers have a hard time conducting their own work of this sort. Peter Maxwell Davies was premiering a piece for clarinet and orchestra of his in the 1960's, Gervaise de Peyer was the soloist. De Peyer had played it with the wrong type of clarinet, but the composer himself didn't realise this and thought the premiere went well until de Peyer broke him the news. The rhythms in the piece where considered innovative for the time, Arthur Bliss had passed on the job of conducting it to the composer, saying it was beyond his ability.

So even pros can have a hard time with new music. Its why I think I can understand what the OP is getting at, in some respects. But that's a thing that goes with the territory.

 

Ok, I really have to get this out.

No, really. You did not.

What do you hope to accomplish with this screed?

Will music of over a hundred years old suddenly go away because you have vented about it?

Will people who love this music feel better after reading your rant?

Do you even feel better? Nothing's going to change as a result, so I'm guessing the answer to this question is "no."

Your disliking something does not make it horrible, just by the way.

 

Christmas Gigs

I think pileofsticks (neat moniker for a bassoonist) needs to hear a story about my youngest son.

He is a music teacher and a freelance bass player in Los Angeles. He has a jazz quartet that plays in the various clubs around LA. During the Christmas season their agent books them to play Christmas Music in the various malls around LA. At one of their gigs their regular tenor sax player could not make it. The agent hired a substitute.

The substitute sax player shows up while they are setting up and asks my son what they were going to be playing.

My son responded the usual Christmas stuff: "Jingle Bells, "Silent Night", "Deck them Halls", etc.. The sax player responded, "Man I don't want to play that stuff."

My son responded, "We are getting paid $2,000 to play this gig. We can split the money four ways or three. It is up to you."

So the sax player took our his horn and played "Jingle Bells, "Silent Night", "Deck them Halls", etc..

 

A possible quote for this thread? "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt." --Abraham Lincoln

 

I thought that quote was from Mark Twain

 

Bassoon players that have the talent to play Le Sacre du Printemps or Ives 4th Symphony do just that. They have no reason to be frustrated and displace their hostility onto the composers. :lol:

 

Poor lamb, having managed to escape all the evils of the ugly art, music, and literature and all other inventions of the last one hundred and twenty-four years from intruding upon an ever so peaceful, harmonious and melodic life, then only to have that all thrust upon him at once as a bassoonist in a youth orchestra.

Oh, the humanity!

 

but I have to say that Stravinsky is a crazy a$$ b1***. Let's start off with the Rite of Spring. Why the heck is it so high? Weirdest rhythms ever! Atonality! Never really follows the key signature!

I can only feel pity for someone incapable of getting one of the most trascendental pieces of art music ever composed. It's only their loss after all...

 

The best thing to do is just appreciate the music you like and not dwell on the stuff you don't.

 

The only thing a person should keep in mind here is that this member is young and new to classical music. Like the seasons of the year, tastes change. Give it time and one, two, three years from now this member will be wondering what possessed them to even create this thread.

 

I can understand the OP's feelings because that's how I feel about most new country. But I can't understand feeling that way about Stravinsky. Poor guy! But love what you love without disparaging what other people love. If you insist on insulting the music that other people love, all you accomplish is to reinforce the mutual scornfest that cluster-ruins the whole classical music scene.

Do be above that.

 

Musicians Obligations

As a performing musician the point has nothing to do with whether or not the young man likes The Rite of Spring. This work is part of the orchestral repertoire and all musicians have know how to play it whether they like it or not.

When you play in an orchestra you have an obligation to play whatever is in the music folder irregardless if it is Leroy Anderson, Beethoven or Berg. If you have to play music you despise, you do not have the option to change the radio station or turn off the stereo. One has to play the music and do the best job they can. For every Mahler one has to play a Mancini. If he wants to be a successful member of an orchestra this is a lesson he has to learn. I know I had to learn it.

I played with a volunteer orchestra where we had a bassoonist who was one of the biggest snobs I have ever met. He was a nice guy, but if the music was not Beethoven like it was manure. Well we occasionally play pops concerts. When we did he complained about how horrible the music was. Finally the director had had enough. He told the man that we play all sorts of music. Since he can not handle the pop stuff he would have to leave.

One day pileofsticks may have to play The Rite. If he does not like it and does a poor job of performing it, he will be out of a job. He is competing with too many bassoonists who like The Rite and know how to play it.

 

... but I have to say that Stravinsky is a crazy a$$ b1***. Let's start off with the Rite of Spring. Why the heck is it so high? Weirdest rhythms ever! Atonality! Never really follows the key signature!

Stravinsky, in most textbooks, music history books and music encyclopedias, is considered "The Bach of the 20th Century."

You might have to learn to just deal with it

 

I prefer to think of Bach as the Stravinsky of the 1700s :3

 

Most sources seem to attribute it to Lincoln, a few to Clemens. None cite a source.

 

The trouble with internet postings, and their very long shelf-life, is that what one says as a young and relatively green performer can years later come back at them in the middle of a later successful career.

Just imagine twenty years from now, the OP confronted with this text written here, with, "But, here, you said...." :lol:...:lol:...:lol:...

 

Check out this Stravinsky piece, in his Neoclassical style:
Octet for wind instruments (flute; clarinet in B♭ and A; two bassoons; trumpet in C; trumpet in A; tenor trombone; bass trombone)

Great bassoon parts!