Klarinet Archive - Posting 000668.txt from 2003/06

From: "LARISA DUFFY & DAVID DOW" <DUFFYL@-----.CA>
Subj: Re: [kl] Political postings - ON topic?
Date: Fri, 20 Jun 2003 22:31:52 -0400

My grandfather fought in the South Pacific for the US Marines and came out
saying War is Wrong...maybe our veterans are wrong.....the definition of
Totalitarianism is a sematic arguement at best....oogh We could bomb them
with 40 Eb clarinets playing Stranger on the Shore and win in 5
minutes.... ---- Original Message -----
From: "Mark Gresham" <mgresham@-----.com>
Subject: Re: [kl] Political postings - ON topic?

>
> Feodor wrote:
> > This strikes me... The totalitarian regimes always tried to persuade
> > people that "...politics is not what you need. Don't talk or think about
> > politics and you will be OK". This works in China. Looks like it works
> > in the US too.
>
> Totalitarian regimes tell you that "the only purpose of music is in
> the service of social change (politics)" of their own persuasion.
> Witness the experiences of Shostakovitch and Prokofiev, amongst others.
> Totalitarian regimes fear the arts so much that they desperately want
> to control them, to convince us that there is no reason for arts except
> to serve politics.
>
> > Politics is an integral part of our lives. You may be more or less
> > effected by it, but you ARE effected. Next time somebody will tell you
> > that clarinet pieces written by Iraqi composers are politically
> > incorrect and you will turn around and say OK???
>
> No, if you mean assessing an "Iraqi" as a class of political position
> rather than a citizenship or a national origin. (And in the US, at
> least, what is considered "political correctness" would generally work
> on the *other* side of that political equation anyway.)
>
> One of the composers I represent (and his father) had to escape the
> Soviet tanks that rolled into Prague in 1968.
> I have both had music banned for socio-political reasons, and had it
> performed for socio-political causes with which I do not agree.
> Nevertheless, in neither case was the purpose of the music or texts
> to there defend, support, or attack a political position.
> Politics may indeed affect all of us, but we need not be creatively
> subservient to politics, nor hang all of our judgements and decisions
> upon political criteria. It is politics that wishes to control us by
> demanding we judge all experiences by its terms and criteria.
> You question about Iraqi composers begs the concept that a decision
> about their music that can only be based upon the terms of politics.
> That is very wrong.
> Hopefully most readers of this list can conceive of the idea that
> politics is not the only cause of life experiences, and definitely not
> the only reason for creative expression.
> When you base all human decisions on political criteria, then you
> have become the slave of politics itself -- the most totalitarian regime
> of all.
>
> --
> Mark Gresham, composer
> mgresham@-----.com/
> Lux Nova Press http://www.luxnova.com/
> LNP Retail Webstore http://www.luxnova.com/lnpwebstore/
>
>
>
>
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