Klarinet Archive - Posting 000205.txt from 1998/07

From: "Sherry Katz" <slkatz@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] Cultural Relativism (was Mozart and the V word)
Date: Wed, 8 Jul 1998 16:07:38 -0400

I think you've sort of hit it but not exactly.

The reason that a "fact" is not a "fact" is more than just the question of
subjective vs. objective. Just what is "objective." If you say meat is
contaminated - that is really a generalization - that the meat is invaded by
a bacteria. But is that really contamination - not all bacteria is bad and
all meat has bacteria. And what is the bacteria. Calling something a
bacteria is also a generalization and subjective observation, as is calling
something "meat". There is really no level that is finite enough that you
can definitively say that it is a "fact".

Another factor is that when it comes to playing music, no matter how much
training you have, the music that comes from a particular individual is
always an interpretation. That interpretation comes from the sum total of
what that individual is. That's why you can "copy" someone else's style and
still be uniquely original. No person playing in the twentieth century - no
matter how much they use authentic instruments, choose an "authentic" hall,
study the performance style of Mozart, or anything else is anything other
than a person in the 20th century playing Mozart.

This may be cultural relativism, but it's also they way it is. Oh yeah, I
graduated from Law School and passed the bar in a couple of states and even
worked as a lawyer for 15 years or so. <g>

Sherry Katz

-----Original Message-----
From: Kevin Fay (LCA) <kevinfay@-----.com>
Date: Wednesday, July 08, 1998 1:11 PM
Subject: [kl] Cultural Relativism (was Mozart and the V word)

>Wow. Deja Vu all over again. What we have here is the entire debate over
>cultural relativism, boiled down to the question of whether it is
>appropriate to use vibrato in the Mozart concerto.
>

>In a nutshell: the "conservative" position is that facts are facts, and
>that you can tell or prove they are facts ("truths") by personal
>observation. An example--the "fact" that a specimen of hamburger meat is
>contaminated. I know this because I can see the bacteria under a
>microscope; if I wait, I can tell by smelling. Now, if you can't see the
>bacteria, it's because your microscope is defective--the microbes are still
>there.

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