Dear friends of the forum,
with this post I would like to start a discussion (which I hope will be interesting) on a matter that I have already had the chance to reflect upon, but which has recently resurfaced.
I am currently attending a series of lectures dedicated to Beethoven's piano sonatas at the Accademia Musicale Praeneste (Rome branch, near Piazza Bologna), held by Piero Rattalino. The intention was to listen to all of them (32 "official" ones plus three other unnumbered opuses), partly live as well, if there were any pianists willing (we listened to op. 22 and 57 live). However, the lecture series is now nearing its end, and we will have to settle for having heard only some of them.
Now, I want to clarify that I have a profound admiration for Rattalino, a person of enormous culture, who at the venerable age of nearly 86 still has the strength and clarity to devote himself to training young pianists and communicating his immense passion for music. However... on some things he says, I do not quite agree, and this even provided an opportunity for discussion at the last meeting (Saturday, February 11th).
These lectures have been an opportunity to talk not only about Beethoven's sonatas, but about many other topics: a sociological analysis of the choices made by Beethoven and other musicians of his era, an analysis of aesthetics and musical interpretation, as well as a painful analysis of the current crisis of live music, with even prestigious musical institutions closing down or barely surviving.
Now, I won't stay here making a summary of the countless things said; I would only like to focus on one point, which concerns primarily those who write music (I, as you know, am a simple amateur who, when I can and if I feel like it, composes something, but without haste and without worries: I do it precisely "for pleasure," because I like it).
One of the issues that has been debated is the following: does music have a "meaning"—that is, to be understood and appreciated it needs some reference outside of the music itself—or is it "asemantic" and expresses only itself?
We know that in the history of music there was a period when "program music" was very fashionable: often, evocative titles that were entirely invented were "stuck" onto certain pieces (this also happened with LVB's sonatas) solely for the purpose of stimulating the audience's imagination. Personally, in my small way (actually tiny, because I am nobody and cannot compare myself to the giants of music), for some time I was convinced (perhaps also due to cultural influences) that music should have a meaning, and in some cases, I even wrote some explicitly descriptive pieces. However, over time I changed my mind, and now I think the opposite: that it is the structures that make the music, and that when we think we perceive a meaning, it is actually because we already know the reference.
Apropos of this, let me tell you about an experiment I did many years ago. I wrote a suite for piano, made up of many small pieces (not difficult ones), which had a precise reference. Initially, however, I did not write the titles of the individual tracks. I let some friends listen to them (including people who, like me, studied music), asking them to tell me what they represented. No one was able to answer, even though it was a reference to something they could not help but know. After some time, I organized a small concert (a thing among friends) in which I presented various pieces of mine, including this suite. Subsequently, various people who listened to the same pieces (this time knowing the titles) told me that some of them rendered perfectly what they referred to. This convinced me that meaning does not exist in music, and if a listener thinks they perceive one, it is only because they already know the titles. On the other hand, try to imagine someone who has never had the chance in their life to know Smetana's symphonic poems: do you think it is possible, without having any reference, to understand that the first describes a castle, the second a river, and so on? The only objective thing that can be said is that at the end of the second piece, the main theme of the first reappears.
Many examples could be brought up in this regard: Berlioz, for example, was convinced that although his famous Symphonie Fantastique had a very precise program, and therefore it would have been appropriate for spectators to be aware of it, it could nonetheless be appreciated as absolute music. And what about Brahms, one of the champions of absolute music? Few of his pieces bear a subtitle (Tragic Overture, Academic Overture, and a few others); if someone told me that the first movement of the fourth symphony represents something, I would think it is a completely subjective interpretation of theirs, not
demonstrable and not verifiable, therefore not universal (and in that case it is better to say nothing).
What do you all think about all this?
A greeting to everyone
Gino (from Rome)
