Klarinet Archive - Posting 000296.txt from 2008/11

From: "Michael Nichols" <mrn.clarinet@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] Johann Strauss Waltzes & Rite of Spring
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2008 14:30:53 -0500

> If the music can't be thoroughly understood on the
> first listening, it is a Failure by Popular Music Standards,
> but it *might* be leaning in a more intellectual direction,
> which is the Mail Goal of "classical" Music: to impress the
> Music Theory experts.

Don't get me wrong--I love learning about music theory, and I also
like to listen to 20th century music, especially that of the
"neo-classical" composers like Hindemith. But I don't think I'd go so
far as to say that the main goal of classical music is to "impress the
music theory experts." I'd say that the main goal of classical music
is to make good art.

In fact, I'm inclined to say that in the classical world you are much
more likely to hear music that defies established principles of music
theory than you are in jazz or popular music. John Coltrane's Giant
Steps was considered innovative in jazz because its chord changes
cycled in thirds (a subtle sort of innovation only a "theory-literate"
person can fully appreciate). In the "classical world," on the other
hand, Schoenberg developed a way of writing music that, if followed to
the letter, was so far removed the from existing music theory that one
needed to know virtually nothing about the music theory of the time to
write music with it.

In fact, music theory is precisely what makes it possible to write
music that "theory illliterate" people can understand and appreciate,
because it systematizes the manner in which *existing pieces* were
constructed. If you are not trying to write something that can be
understood in the aesthetic framework of existing musical forms then,
strictly speaking, you don't need it. You can just make up your own
musical language--that doesn't necessarily mean what you write will be
good, but, as they warn us in the textbooks, using existing techniques
derived from a study of music theory doesn't guarantee that your music
will be good, either.

A lot of the great musical compositions (including many of my
favorites) do happen to be interesting from a theoretical standpoint,
but I still think it's a bit of a stretch to say that the main goal of
classical music is to impress the theory experts--maybe that's true if
you're composing something as a class assignment and you want to
demonstrate your knowledge to the professor, but outside of an
academic environment, I fail to see how impressing the theory experts
can possibly be the *main goal* of classical music as whole. That
certainly wasn't Stravinsky's goal when he wrote his masterpieces.

When asked "What is theory in musical composition?" Stravinsky replied:

"Hindsight. It doesn't exist. There are compositions from which it
is deduced. Or, if this isn't quite true, it has a by-product
existence that is powerless to create or even to justify.
Nevertheless, composition involves a deep intuition of 'theory.'"
(from Robert Craft and Igor Stravinsky, "Conversations with Igor
Stravinsky" (1959) pp. 12-13)

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