tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post4640750423549599504..comments2024-03-27T23:06:03.736-05:00Comments on The Music Salon: Good Writing on MusicBryan Townsendhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09482696991279345516noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-55678792432319526982013-08-01T08:33:25.744-05:002013-08-01T08:33:25.744-05:00Hi Nathaniel,
I suspect that we have similar opin...Hi Nathaniel,<br /><br />I suspect that we have similar opinions about Taruskin. I think he is a brilliant scholar with an impressively wide range of knowledge. He is also a brilliant writer capable of striking polemics which I usually find very provocative in the best way. But he also tends to go too far. Previously I have objected to his thoughts on the way rhythm is handled in Early Music. He seems to think it is always rigid and related to the neoclassical elements in modernism. Perhaps there is a grain of truth there. He says:<br /><br />"The impersonalism of Early Music has resulted in performances of unprecedented formal clarity and precision. It has also resulted in a newly militant reluctance to make the subtle, constant adjustments of tempo and dynamics on which expressivity depends, for these can have no sanction but personal feeling."<br /><br />But there are hosts of performers of Early Music who use loads of rubato--and not Chopinesque rubato either, but that proper to the music. Just listen to Gustav Leonhardt playing an unmeasured prelude by Louis Couperin for one example out of hundreds.<br /><br />And thanks to you for mentioning another example of Taruskin's overzealous claims.<br /><br />But thank goodness he exists! Because he sure gets people thinking.Bryan Townsendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09482696991279345516noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-5680191203010993962013-07-31T18:55:47.366-05:002013-07-31T18:55:47.366-05:00Hi Bryan,
Thanks for the new links.
The Taruskin...Hi Bryan,<br /><br />Thanks for the new links.<br /><br />The Taruskin article is interesting.<br />Coming from an early music background myself, I've seen quite a lot of the dogmatic tendencies that some of the people involved push. It's not even early western music but afficionado's of early jazz as well and it's at the point where I now become immediately skeptical when I hear the word 'style' used in a debate to defend musical choices.<br /><br />However, There is quite a lot wrong with it too. I don't agree entirely with his statements regarding counter tenors and their place in early music. He himself seems to be conveniently skipping over aspects of history that don't support his position. One example would be the spanish falsettist school that was quite well known for turning out good singers during the renaissance and is often cited as a precursor to the castrati - Certainly not english or anglican.<br /><br />(I'm also pretty sure that Handel did use falsettists in a few of his oratorio productions...I just wish I could remember the singers name and which productions.)Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13680625603206089113noreply@blogger.com