Why We Want to Write Music

Piccinesco wrote:

For example (CromaDiBrera will split me into 4 in an hour) when I go out for long "walks" (of fatigue), I also listen to the entire Well-Tempered Clavier twice in a row, and I don't get tired, [...]

This is a good one...! Why on earth would I "split you into 4"? I know you are referring to a conversation of ours on Fb (about the fact that Baroque is not just Bach), but look, I have listened to the WTC (by Bob Van Asperen) not just 2 times, but dozens of times in a row, from morning to night...! Sorry, but just to clarify...

I was about to say, sometimes I think I'm being annoying by always talking about Bach (I put myself in others' shoes).

Anyway, the other night I "discovered" something absurd, I'll talk about it later, and this despite having listened to (or thought I had listened to)

the whole Well-Tempered Clavier.

Piccinesco wrote:

Anyway, the other night I "discovered" something absurd, I'll talk about it later, and this is despite having listened to (or thought I had listened to) all of The Well-Tempered Clavier.

Now you've made me curious! And your physical endurance has also made me curious: it's fine that you called them "long, tiring walks," but to listen to the WTC twice in a row takes 7 hours at best (GG's recording lasts exactly three and a half hours). Talk about endurance!

I was stunned (in a good way) when the other night (I am talking about a harpsichordist to whom I wrote to ask if I could send her some sheet music) I listened to some Bach preludes and fugues, specifically from The Well-Tempered Clavier; I'll tell you in advance it's nothing special, but for me it felt somewhat absurd because I thought I had heard it all, as I actually have a collection of a Gould performance (whom I almost disliked at first since everyone was talking about him, but then after listening closely and becoming familiar with his playing style, I grew fond of him).

So, I listened to the prelude and fugue from the 2nd book, BWV 887, and I am sure I had never heard it before that moment; I liked it also because I often write in 9/8 and 12/8, and the fugue is written in 6/8, so always with "ternary" subdivisions, in other words, of three eighth notes, even though here the movement is binary.

Anyway, I had never heard it, so what did I miss?

I have 48 pieces in total; it's 48, right, understood as prelude and fugue together, so 96 in total.

It seems strange to me that I didn't "notice" while listening to them; just think that I remember some of them almost by heart, but at this point perhaps it is just me involuntarily forgetting something because it is indeed strange—who knows, maybe I only downloaded (legally) half of each volume, kudos to myself, I must check.

The physical stamina is there, although I don't know how long I will hold up with certain rhythms; fortunately, I don't always have to do certain "walks," which are tiring because when I walk I go at a brisk pace; once I had fun checking my maximum speed at a brisk pace, 7.5 km/h, but on the street people take you for a fool—it's true I always say I'm a bit crazy, but if I didn't go fast, I would have to be out for more than 10 hours.

I distribute flyers alone, and often I have covered an entire town in one morning, and since I am fed up with hearing the usual comments from people like (verbatim, mind you) "aren't you bringing me my money?", "what are you bringing me today?", "you're annoying us?", and even "threats" sometimes, diplomacy is not in my nature and I have struggled over time to "build up" a bit; so, seeing as between comments and such "questions," traffic, endless noises, one is more tired from noise pollution than from the kilometers traveled, for a few months now I have been listening to music, and the feeling I often have is of a deadly gap between the usual things I am told (but others are also told the same things, never a different topic, it's always about money, always the same jokes, and the milk flows from the knees without interruption), the context in which I live (which is made only of concrete, asphalt, buildings, cars, and zero natural smells, which only "come back into force" in case of a flood, like the smell of wet earth and grass—these are examples of smells that are no longer sensed, so much have we become desensitized to pollution) and the depth of these works; certain pieces break me in two because then you listen to them alone while you struggle, but at the same time they are also a source of strength and endurance. When I think of the kids who say "I have to stay on my feet for 3/4 hours dancing, how can I do it if I don't take something?", on one hand they make me laugh, on the other they make me angry; since I was little, I have said that the best drug is the brain, we already have everything we need to think and act, so that is an excuse for not feeling isolated from others.

Anyway, the best time is in the early afternoon, around 2/3 PM, with that sun that isn't bothersome, during autumn—a masterpiece, a true pleasure (in the fatigue and the repetitive gesture I must perform); this is why yesterday I was talking about a worker who makes music; I live this "double" sensation, which in reality is one and the same: you can do both things very well.

For the record (but in that case, I wasn't listening to music while out yet), one day I was out for 13/14 hours, a massacre.

In certain cases, I don't listen to music because if the route I have to take is truly heavy, I avoid it; it's an extra "stress" even if it is pleasant.

This is the link where I listened to the prelude and fugue I was talking about:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=in3xjoguhI8"}

Open content (youtube)

Piccinesco wrote:

(...) I listened to the prelude and fugue from the 2nd book, BWV 887, and I am sure I had never heard it before that moment; I liked it also because I often write in 9/8 and 12/8, the fugue is written in 6/8, so always with "ternary" subdivisions, in short, of three eighth notes, even if here the movement is binary.

Anyway, I had never heard it, so what have I missed?

I have 48 pieces in total, it's 48 right, intended as prelude and fugue together, so 96 in total.

I don't know what to tell you... GG recorded the complete CBT and, therefore, the Prelude and Fugue in G# minor (no. 18 of the 2nd book) BWV 887 is obviously there. There are indeed 48 Preludes and Fugues, so a total of 96 pieces, as you correctly calculated... I can't help you more than that. Perhaps, indeed, you never reached that point and therefore had truly never heard it?

I confirm, I had never listened to them like this; just like all the preludes and fugues from no. 13 to 24 of both books, I have missed half the work until now.

First I checked on the PC, I had literally forgotten that I had only downloaded half of the preludes and fugues of each book, and the funny thing is that on the files

it even says they go up to no. 12, another demonstration that my concentration is failing me.

Anyway, it's a good thing, I will have another 48 pieces to listen to, now I'll see about downloading them quickly.

What a thing, I only had volume 1, how embarrassing.

CromaDiBrera wrote:

You really must be overflowing with self-esteem to tell someone you don't know, who thinks differently, that they should stop...! Perhaps it is because I am used to letting others decide whether my work has artistic depth or not, rather than deciding for myself. Therefore, I fear that I will not stop at all, and that certain Savonarolas visited by the sacred fire of Art, ready to get irritated and judge anyone who possesses a sensitivity different from their own, will just have to accept it.

I don't know where you get these judgments from... if my intervention was meant to be interpreted that way, I apologize, for goodness' sake...

However, I want to say first and foremost that I am absolutely calm, and that I do not think I advised Dante to stop. On the contrary, if anything.

The question was: why do we write music? It implied: why do we make music when someone else has already done it or is doing it better than us? My answer was, in short: because (as Piccinesco says) we like it, because we feel the need for it, because for us it is something endowed with meaning regardless, like beauty, like sex, like love.

Anyone who has dealt with anything artistic (I'm sorry, I use this term not so much because they have been "visited by the sacred fire" but because I don't know any others) knows what I am talking about.

I also want to say that, for me, even a child drawing is an artist if they do it driven by a creative need. There is no need to be Michelangelo or Mozart.

My final judgment was directed at those who, on the contrary, write without experiencing this pleasure, without feeling the inner necessity (I don't know why Cromadibrera felt called into question).

Mind you, however, it was not an invitation to stop. If these people do it as a profession, hats off to them; it is certainly the most beautiful job one can do. But if, in addition to not feeling an inner motivation, they don't even earn money from it, then one truly has to ask themselves why they do it.

pestatasti wrote:

The question was: why do we write music? It implied: why do we make music when someone else has already done it or is doing it better than us?

My point of view is, so to speak, "skeptically confident": it is absolutely impossible to equal Bach... but it is certainly possible to do something extraordinary and never heard before (it is possible... but it is very, very difficult!).

RedScharlach wrote:

My point of view is, so to speak, "skeptically confident": it is absolutely impossible to equal Bach... but it is certainly possible to do something extraordinary and never heard before (it is possible... but it is very, very difficult!).

But what does "equal Bach" mean...? It's not like it's a competitor on X-Factor...! There are no rankings...!

With all due respect, all of this is so far from what is commonly meant by "culture" that one truly doesn't know what to say.

Moreover, for someone who has completed regular studies in composition, it should be normal to know how to write with knowledge in the style of the masters of the past.

pestatasti wrote:

I don't know where you are getting these judgments from... if my intervention was to be interpreted that way, I apologize, for goodness' sake...

However, I want to say first and foremost that I am absolutely calm, and that I do not think I advised Dante to stop. On the contrary, if anything.

You didn't advise it to Dante but, in your previous intervention, you wrote that those who think in a certain way different from yours (that is, like me, and it was not at all ambiguous: one only needs to reread) "should stop". You wrote it yourself.

RedScharlach wrote:

My point of view is, so to speak, "skeptically confident": it is absolutely impossible to equal Bach.. but it is certainly possible to do something extraordinary and never heard before (it is possible… but it is very, very difficult!).

My point of view, however, is very skeptical regarding this response: it is an attitude on the verge of creative stasis, if taken to the extreme (perhaps I have already said this). Then, I wonder: why Bach specifically? And in what sense "to equal" (this has already been asked by CromaDiBrera, but I am asking it too)?

CromaDiBrera wrote:

Moreover, for someone who has completed regular studies in composition, it should be normal to know how to write with knowledge in the style of the masters of the past.

Let's say that it is desirable, but in practice it almost never happens this way, because the use made of notions regarding composition is not put at the service of faithful stylistic reconstructions in a historical sense aimed at understanding what a style that worked and still says much to us today is truly made of. Therefore, a composition student typically does not know how to write "in the manner of," as happens instead with painters, and it often happens that they are pushed (I hope at least with the intent of developing their creative side) to continue material (usually historical) from others, which possesses certain characteristics that cannot be respected; their "own" way is almost entirely devoid of a taste for a certain style.

I leave you to imagine the consequences in terms of results: abstract exercises with a properly anachronistic flavor. Anachronistic because there is no real modern and creative approach to historical material, which can only produce something below the reference stylistic models that have set the standard.

Then, understandably, one suffers from inferiority complexes. Having 1000 compositions by Bach at your disposal, it is almost impossible not to know how to write in his style. Eventually, the difficulty lies in creating a functioning style like his. How can one do so without having reconstructed one? How can one do so without having internalized an effective compositional "path" that produces a result with high artistic content (and not just craftsmanship)? Etc.

The history of alleged stylistic reconstructions, however, applies to those who have completed ex-inferior/ex-medium levels; finally, in the last 3 years (ex-superior completion), you can follow your musical instinct... but what? In an almost post-structuralist context, you have to justify every note with a project... usually with extramusical references.

Ergo, when does school offer you the possibility of understanding what a style is truly made of? Note that this is the basis for leading an aspiring composer to express their ideas in a concrete, credible, and current way.

Therefore, what you are suggesting (dear Croma) is the ideal; indeed, several teachers are making statements aimed at moving beyond an abstract idea of composition in favor of a school closer to reality and the concreteness of the subject matter.

In my opinion, the difficulty lies in being credible; the rest are just choices.

This does not mean that school is useless; it means that it must improve greatly. Currently, an attempt is made to develop only a part of the skills a composer must have; the rest is "too much" entrusted to each individual's talent and sensitivity.

Not a bad thing, but in my opinion, it is not a matter for school...

Carlos wrote:

Then, I wonder: why Bach specifically? And in what sense "equal" (CromaDiBrera has already asked this, but I am asking too)?

Bach... for a matter of eminently personal taste: he is my favorite composer!

But I could have written Verdi, Beethoven, Josquin, Xenakis...

In any case, pieces such as the Mass in B minor and The Art of Fugue represent – always subjectively – a kind of non plus ultra. How can one do something of equal value?

And yet this conviction is counterbalanced by the observation that interesting-beautiful-stunning-moving music continues to be composed to this day. The past is not an obstacle for the present because different musics do not exclude each other.

RedScharlach wrote:

(...) interesting-beautiful-amazing-emotional music continues to be composed to this day. The past is not an obstacle for the present because different musics do not exclude one another.

Well said.

Frank wrote:

This does not mean that school is useless, it means that it must improve greatly. Currently, one tries to develop only a part of the skills that a composer must have; the rest is "too" entrusted to each individual's talent and sensitivity.

I am adding a detail alongside these very justified remarks: the practice of "writing in style" seems to me to be one of the most stimulating means for internalizing the languages of the past. The study of counterpoint theory takes on an entirely different light as soon as one attempts to write a motet in the style of Josquin. The "impudent" attempt to compose a series of variations in the style of Beethoven is probably destined to fail, but in exchange, it reveals aspects of Beethovenian thought that perhaps had not yet been grasped.

The reform of composition teaching also lays the groundwork for a renewal of the practice of "writing in style," exactly in the sense you were hinting at. Obviously, teaching programs will do very little on their own: a modernization of pedagogy will be necessary, which is not at all linear (if all goes well, it will take years to see appreciable results in the system).

A problem remains open: learning to compose in perfect Bachian or Brahmsian style certainly serves to train technique and refine sensitivity, but how much does it contribute to the development of one's own compositional autonomy? Were the seven years of study you were talking about (lower + middle completion) not actually too many?

...perhaps even the last 3 were too many, wasting time on "insipid" experiments; do you think Puccini had to justify why he wrote in his particular way? At most, he could have told you: "listen and learn"

In my opinion, the problem with the reform is that it is handed over to the same teachers who, precisely, could have done more or differently even under the previous system.

RedScharlach wrote:

A problem remains open: learning to compose in perfect Bachian or Brahmsian style serves, for one thing, to train technique and refine sensitivity, but how much does it contribute to the development of one's own compositional autonomy?

In my opinion, from many points of view, yes; if you have ideas (only you can have them) and you have matured technique and sensitivity... well, you are a composer

Given that I very much enjoyed your intervention and others (obviously)

RedScharlach wrote:

I would add a detail on the margins of these perfectly justified remarks: the exercise of "writing in style" seems to me to be one of the most stimulating means for internalizing the languages of the past. The study of counterpoint theory takes on an entirely different light as soon as one attempts to write a motet in the style of Josquin. The "impudent" attempt to compose a series of variations in the style of Beethoven is probably destined to fail, but in return, it reveals aspects of Beethovenian thought that perhaps had not yet been grasped.

...and you're saying very little? You know how much it stays with you. The syntax might pass, but the thought is that of a great composer and elaborator. Your harmonic signature, your way of treating melody, your counterpoint, your orchestration, etc., will make the difference... but the summation of all the thoughts that you have managed to make your own... well.

Beethoven himself made the criteria of his predecessors his own; let's not even talk about your beloved Bach, who consumed himself within tradition. The problem of stylistic reconstructions is purely twentieth-century (coincidentally from 1930 onwards); before that, everyone knew what they were and measured themselves against this art.