"Contemporary" music

thallo wrote:

Before "becoming" a minimalist, La Monte Young was a conceptual artist. With different results and intentions... he wrote some pieces called "Compositions 1960". Composition 1960 #10 consists of an instruction, "Draw a straight line and follow it". In La Monte Young's intentions, it should be a sort of yoga exercise; obviously, the performer's freedom is maximal. It seems that David Tudor, Cage's pianist (for lack of a better term), interpreted the piece by dipping his hands in paint and tracing a strip on the floor with his hands...

A to add charm, sensuality, to a conceptual work, especially if musical, it takes very little :-) it takes performance

... am I wrong, or did you not relate the concept to "provocation"

I would like to respond to Virtus, risking repeating things already said because I haven't managed to read everything (what a discussion!), but trying to remain at a simple level.

Contemporary music is like jazz; it is vast, so the question isn't quite well-posed...

I think that in every listening and every observation, it is generally pleasant to recognize a sign, a synthesis, especially a coherence, which sometimes can also be subjective and could even be unconscious (on the part of the author). This doesn't mean you must necessarily find it, but in listening, you must be well-disposed and without prejudices or preconceptions.

I also think that knowledge increases the capacity to appreciate and therefore also the enjoyment. It also applies to Beethoven and the other greats of the past, if you think about it. The analysis of the piece and the technological background (knowledge of the violin and piano, like a filter or frequency modulation), as well as the cultural context in which the piece itself was born, I think gives an extra boost. I see nothing wrong with that.

Nevertheless, it is not mandatory: I remember "arguing" with a student at the conservatory because I said that listening to Maderna gave me a sense of peace, but it was the truth, beyond what the author wanted to convey and my knowledge on the subject (and then the sense of peace can also derive from the feeling of understanding and harmony with the author and with the listening experience, but he was too "intellectual")

I would advise not limiting oneself too much: our auditory and cognitive system is formidable, and setting it in motion can provide much satisfaction!

You make me think of when at school I tried to reveal to my classmates that listening to Genesis (just one example) was much more pleasant for me than most of the light music promoted on the radio, and that it would probably have become so for them too if they had had the patience to listen to it a couple more times... It's not just a matter of taste, but also of willingness to listen and trust in others.

I find various listenings, by very different authors, to be wonderful: Bach, Cage, Marcello, Chopin, Schoenberg, Webern, Orlando di Lasso, Roscoe Mitchell, Miles Davis, Terry Riley, and so on, and I cannot think of dividing and categorizing my enjoyment. The secret lies in listening, in the predisposition towards the work and towards others in general, and I find your observation sad and biased.

Regarding sound, I actually find it to be a boundless and extremely interesting world that can have an important weight in a work. It has always been this way, except that in modern times, thanks also to electronics and computer science, we have acquired an enormous capacity for investigation and control, and it is natural to remain fascinated by it and that, in certain cases, attention to "sound" is preponderant.

Happy listening!

Frank wrote:

... am I wrong or did you not relate the concept to "provocation"

La Monte Young left the Fluxus group (ask Google, for those who didn't know) precisely because I thought it was limited to provocation, that it was a kind of neo-Dadaism. What can I say, in my opinion, even provocation can be done well or done poorly. In general, provoking should simply mean calling the audience into question in some way, forcing a reaction from them. Sometimes performance is considered a kind concession, a consequence of a trance state: I play Beethoven in mystical ecstasy and you, who happen to be there, must feel honored to listen to it... A performance MADE FOR the audience (and not made for the dead author of the score...) very often becomes "provocative."

I took it very generally, eh... then everyone uses these concepts however they want

Ignazio's post is interesting. I would like to ask you a question... In your opinion, does there exist in music that which is objectively beautiful? This implies that all people listening to that composition, a candidate for being representative of objectivity, say that it is beautiful. Therefore, we would fall into subjectivity if there exists at least one person who maintains that it is ugly; pay attention, not someone who claims they have heard better, but someone for whom it is simply ugly...

TheSimon wrote:

is there such a thing as what is objectively beautiful in music?

... probably what is valid exists, objectively

thallo wrote:

La Monte Young left the Fluxus group (ask Google, for those who didn't know) precisely because I thought it was limited to provocation, that it was a kind of neo-Dadaism. What can I say, in my opinion, even provocation can be done well or done poorly. In general, provoking should simply mean calling the audience into question in some way, forcing a reaction from them. Sometimes performance is considered a kind gesture, a consequence of a trance state: I play Beethoven in mystical ecstasy and you, who happen to be there, must feel honored to listen to it... A performance MADE FOR the audience (and not made for the dead author of the score...) very often becomes "provocative."

I've taken this very generally, eh... then everyone uses these concepts as they wish

Interesting, but my provocation was linked to the relationship between conceptual art and music

Frank wrote:

Today (it's not true, always) I have become obsessed with sensuality.

How would you apply this concept to conceptual art? I ask in a declaratively provocative way: do you consider it music?

TheSimon wrote:

Ignazio's post is interesting. I would like to ask you a question... In your opinion, does what is objectively beautiful exist in music? This implies that all the people listening to that composition, a candidate for being representative of objectivity, say that it is beautiful. Therefore, we would fall into subjectivity if there exists at least one person who claims it is ugly—mind you, not someone claiming they have heard better, but someone for whom it is simply ugly...

No, I do not believe in the existence of objective beauty! (Is that a question, or are you also asserting that I wrote it?!) However, there are certainly objective elements that can be recognized or not depending on the acuity of the listener and not on taste. Beyond that, judgment remains subjective.

What I maintain, though I am not alone, is that people often hide behind expressions like "it's beautiful," "it's ugly," "it's a matter of taste," "I don't understand it," and the like, which do not pair well with observation in general.

In short, I maintain that it is worth committing more to listening, without rushing to give a judgment! It is beautiful to listen even before saying whether a piece is beautiful or not. Reducing the interaction between a musical work and a person to just two words is truly limiting.

This applies to everything; for example, a glass of wine: being asked "do you like it?" after one sip is disheartening... behind it there can be a world to discover, to try, to reflect upon...

Frank, I have always thought that the question "is it music?" was nonsensical.

From my point of view, music is (!!!) that human activity (or its product) that a relevant community of people defines as "music"

so, conceptual music is music, if a relevant group of people considers it such.

... that being said, I don't think I have spoken about music in these recent posts, I have spoken about art in general ... conceptual art goes a bit beyond the distinctions between music, visual art, theater etc. and this does not diminish its importance

... but Thallo, we started from Cage, to arrive at DrJellyFish's chair

Ok art, but the link must always be to the music

it is a limit that with contemporary music one cannot always set :-)

GnazzJazz wrote:

No, I do not believe in the existence of objective beauty! (Is that a question, or are you also claiming that I wrote it?!) However, there are certainly objective elements that can be recognized or not depending on the acuity of the listener and not on taste. After that, judgment remains subjective.

What I maintain, but am not alone in, is that people often hide behind expressions like 'it's beautiful,' 'it's ugly,' 'it's a matter of taste,' 'I don't understand it,' and the like, which do not pair well with observation in general.

In short, I maintain that it is worth committing more to listening, without rushing to give a judgment! It is beautiful to listen even before saying whether a piece is beautiful or not. Crushing the interaction between a musical work and a person down to just two words is truly limiting.

This applies to everything, for example a glass of wine: being asked 'do you like it?' after one sip is disheartening... behind it there can be a world to discover, to try, to reflect upon...

No no, it was a question. For example, what do you think could be some objective elements that can be recognized? I fully agree that one must listen, but above all, I believe one must "learn how to listen" without being carried away by superficial elements and try to understand deeply what one is listening to in order to then be able to express an aesthetic judgment. However... Taking the example already given of 4'33", in that case, I believe we cannot speak of music but of pure provocation. Music made of non-music is a contradiction in terms by definition, and so how can it be passed off as being within the musical sphere? If you do not believe that objective beauty exists, then by parity of reasoning, objective ugliness must not exist either. A "shitty artist" to me remains shit, no matter what context they are placed in, and it is pure provocation. Is that art? If objective ugliness does not exist, then I would like to find a person (of sound mind) who loves poop. Similarly, finding a person who could call a painting like Raphael's Transfiguration 'ugly' seems absurd to me. At this point, will it be true that objectivity does not exist, at least among the sound-minded? What do you think?

TheSimon wrote:

[...] If you do not believe that objective beauty exists, then objective ugliness must not exist either by parity of reasoning. [...] At this point, would it then be true that objectivity does not exist, at least among the sane? What do you think?

Very interesting observation regarding "objective ugliness." The question of whether it is possible to objectify beauty is also raised in other circles, and I was one of those who maintained that there are things that are incontestably beautiful and others that are incontestably ugly (but I had not been able to formalize the parameters for these two categories). I agree with you: artist's shit is shit and remains shit and is also ugly; this does not deny it the right to be considered a work of art—ugly, but a work of art. Art and beauty are not synonyms, otherwise all beautiful things would be art and all ugly ones would not, but we know that is not the case. An interesting question and one that is difficult to solve.

It seems to me that music and art in general, for about a century and more, have not been required to be "beautiful." And I believe this is also the reason why one still recognizes oneself in more or less classical art (that of "beauty" and "ugliness"): its parameters are still a necessity for the soul. Man has indeed discovered the unconscious (because that is where contemporary art is born), but he is also the same man from millions of years ago, of cave paintings, who evolved by cultivating beauty in all arts until the 1800s.

As far as I am concerned, if we are talking about contemporary [art], I insist on speaking of art and not just music, because I think that the contamination between different arts has been one of its main characteristics (especially due to the unrestrained evolution embraced by the figurative arts, driven by technological progress in the 1900s and still ongoing).

GnazzJazz wrote:

I would like to respond to Virtus, risking repeating things already said, because I haven't managed to read everything (what a discussion!), but trying to remain at a simple level.

Contemporary music is like jazz; it is vast, so the question isn't quite well-posed...

I think that in every listening and in every observation, it is generally pleasant to recognize a sign, a synthesis, above all a coherence, which sometimes can also be subjective and could even be unconscious (on the part of the author). This doesn't mean you must necessarily find it, but in listening, you must be well-disposed and without prejudice or preconceptions.

I also think that knowledge increases the capacity to appreciate and therefore also the enjoyment. It also applies to Beethoven and the other greats of the past, if you think about it. The analysis of the piece and the technological background (knowledge of the violin and the piano, like a filter or frequency modulation), as well as the cultural context in which the piece itself was born, I think gives an extra boost. I see nothing wrong with that.

Nevertheless, it is not mandatory: I remember having "argued" with a student at the conservatory because I said that listening to Maderna gave me a sense of peace, but it was the truth, beyond what the author wanted to convey and my knowledge on the subject (and then the sense of peace can also derive from the feeling of understanding and harmony with the author and with the listening experience, but he was too "intellectual")

I would advise not limiting oneself too much: our auditory and cognitive system is formidable, and setting it in motion can provide many satisfactions!

You make me think of when at school I tried to reveal to my classmates that listening to Genesis (just one example) was much more pleasant for me than most of the pop music played on the radio, and that it would probably have become so for them too if they had had the patience to listen to it a couple more times... It's not just a matter of taste, but also of willingness to listen and trust in others.

I find various listenings, by very different authors, to be wonderful: Bach, Cage, Marcello, Chopin, Schoenberg, Webern, Orlando di Lasso, Roscoe Mitchell, Miles Davis, Terry Riley, and so on, and I cannot think of dividing and categorizing my enjoyment. The secret lies in the listening, in the predisposition towards the work and towards others in general, and I find your observation sad and biased.

Regarding sound, I actually find it to be a boundless and extremely interesting world that can have an important weight in a work. It has always been this way, except that in modern times, thanks also to electronics and computer science, we have acquired an enormous capacity for investigation and control, and it is natural to remain fascinated by it and that in certain cases the attention to "sound" is preponderant.

Happy listening!

I am sorry for having given the impression of being a listener of commercial music on the radio... and here, dear GnazzzJazz, it was, perhaps, a tad sad...

I agree that it is not just a matter of taste but, by the third listening, if the piece doesn't improve, one tends toward masochism. If a work requires repeated and in-depth listening to try to accept it, or rather to process a sense in which to find oneself, well, I objectively and subjectively doubt that it is such, at least in the field of Music and health.....

Happy listening

Open content (youtube)

Vitrus wrote:

I agree that it is not just a matter of taste but, by the third listen, if the piece doesn't grow on you, one tends towards masochism. If a work requires repeated and in-depth listening to try to accept it, or rather to process a sense in which to find oneself in it, well, I objectively and subjectively doubt that it is such, at least in the field of Music and health.....

Sorry, just out of curiosity: how many times have you listened to Wagner, for example, before "accepting" him? I ask because I might be hopeless but, in fact, I had to employ exactly "repeated and in-depth listening" (and I fear it hasn't "grown on me" enough): am I headed for a sanitarium?

CromaDiBrera wrote:

Sorry, just out of curiosity: how many times did you listen to Wagner, for example, before "accepting" him? I ask because I might be hopeless but, in fact, I had to engage in truly "repeated and in-depth listening" (and I even fear that it hasn't quite "sunk in" enough): am I going crazy?

A me il Tannhauser è piaciuto subito...chi ben comincia è a metà dell'opera

But, seriously, do evaluation parameters for contemporary art exist?

and, above all, why do the messages appear to be sent an hour early? ;-)

DrJellyfish wrote:

But, seriously, are there any evaluation parameters for contemporary art?

...especially, no one who has understood anything about Beethoven's great fugue ...

DrJellyfish wrote:

and, above all, why do the messages appear to have been sent an
hour earlier? ;-)

You need to set GMT+1 in your profile settings. If you can't manage it, let me know and I'll see about solving the problem for you.