tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post790092433913613016..comments2024-03-27T23:06:03.736-05:00Comments on The Music Salon: Friday MiscellaneaBryan Townsendhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09482696991279345516noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-22023552393870143752016-04-14T21:18:38.459-05:002016-04-14T21:18:38.459-05:00Hadn't seen that, but I guess this had been co...Hadn't seen that, but I guess this had been coming for quite a while as his health was failing.Bryan Townsendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09482696991279345516noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-88834813789982647972016-04-14T16:04:16.946-05:002016-04-14T16:04:16.946-05:00Bryan, You'll have seen this somewhere or othe...Bryan, You'll have seen this somewhere or other, James Levine being retired at the Metropolitan Opera. NL at Slipped Disc, eh-- [http://slippedisc.com/2016/04/sad-end-for-a-once-great-conductor/]; one commenter said 'tasteless' but really what caught my eye was that he devoted more space to Levine's 'emotional intelligence' and (according to him anyway) his less than great people skills than to his musicianship. Pft. Marc in Eugenehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04331547981498637474noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-64784209427921742082016-04-10T07:52:36.697-05:002016-04-10T07:52:36.697-05:00Patrick, welcome to the Music Salon, where we rese...Patrick, welcome to the Music Salon, where we reserve a special place for curmudgeons!<br /><br />Scruton does not dismiss young people and their music tout simple. He believes that pop music, like all other music, is of variable quality. He is arguing for valuation, judgment and active listening instead of just letting whatever is around lap over you.<br /><br />It seems as if it is the concept of judgement that you reject. This is of course the received wisdom of the day but one that I have spent hundreds of posts trying to critique. Perhaps you might look around on the blog? Just type "aesthetics" into the search gadget. Musical judgement can certainly be very subjective, but that kind of judgement is just poor judgement. When done well, backed up by a great deal of knowledge and experience, aesthetic judgement can be quite objective. But that is a Forbidden Truth these days.Bryan Townsendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09482696991279345516noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-9757126691393858642016-04-10T06:45:47.233-05:002016-04-10T06:45:47.233-05:00Re the Roger Scruton: First he comes across as a c...Re the Roger Scruton: First he comes across as a curmudgeon, smugly dismissing young people and their way of experiencing music. A malicious tone.<br />But to his simplistic solution that we teach 'judgement'. Who's judgement? Pierre Boulez's (RIP)? A Tchaikovsky devotee? A Classical snob who sees no value in folk or jazz styles? I agree with him that learning an instrument is crucial, and I actually think more young people participate in that than he lets on. But musical judgement is terribly subjective, and 'teaching' it is nearly impossible, I tend to think. Even an individual can come to different judgements, depending on their mood and the time of day.ursusdc@netscape.net (Patrick)noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-22849895935989123732016-04-09T12:32:04.003-05:002016-04-09T12:32:04.003-05:00I think the key phrase there was 'jocular mock...I think the key phrase there was 'jocular mockery'-- I would be hard pressed to recall the specific word choices she made. KWAX is broadcasting a recording of the concert next month, I think, that I'll try to listen to. It is possible I'm overly sensistive to even jocular assaults on the old order, ahem. The president of the trustees irritated me at the very beginning, when he took to the stage to beg us to complete the to-be-emailed questionnaire about our reactions to the 'gala', by joking that 'and if you aren't using email you probably shouldn't be at this evening's [Adams/Bernstein/James Johnson ('Charleston')] show'-- presumably if I were there just because of the Mahler I could remain content in my use of pen and ink. It's possible also that I have misunderstood Marin Alsop's history here-- perhaps each of her non-BBB programming choices were cavilled at and fought against tooth and nail; I don't know. She did, in her opening remarks, refer to our fair "little city" and lovely "little orchestra", which I thought was perhaps a bit patronising, ha, but I expect was more rightly understood as simple truth spoken affectionately. The folks I talked to seemed to have been more bemused than outraged by her 'modern' choices; and perhaps learning that she featured Bernstein's Mass (in her last season, did she say?) didn't earn her any points in my book, either. <br /><br />A propos the David Patrick Stearns review of the Tharaud therapeutic Bach, I happened to see this at <a href="http://npw-opera-concerts.blogspot.com/2016/04/berlioz-beatrice-et-benedict.html" rel="nofollow">a site</a> called <i>We left at the interval...</i> (the Berlioz opera <i>Béatrice et Bénédict</i> is being done here next season, so I went looking about; the performance he's talking about was done at La Monnaie's temporary venue): "At the rear was a war-memorial wall of dead soldiers's photos that the living soldiers burst through in modern camouflage with guns (with Brussels still in shock after suicide bombings in March, we had been warned about this in advance by management). Wardrobes that at first were linen cupboards became soldiers' lockers, and were later used for hiding in and eavesdropping from before lying down and turning into a banqueting table. Washtubs became bathtubs as the soldiers stripped to their boxers to soap down. ("This being La Monnaie," said a friend after, "it's a wonder they kept anything on at all.")" It doesn't seem like this was therapeutic Berlioz.Marc in Eugenehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04331547981498637474noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-80276026903747594442016-04-09T09:05:17.612-05:002016-04-09T09:05:17.612-05:00Marin Alsop was for quite a few years the music di...Marin Alsop was for quite a few years the music director of the Cabrillo Festival, an important festival of contemporary music. So she is something of a specialist in contemporary music just as Trevor Pinnock is a specialist in 18th century music. I'm not sure we should hold that against her.<br /><br />What did she say or do that was a denigration of the classical canon? I'm curious.Bryan Townsendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09482696991279345516noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-22590751691198969182016-04-08T18:36:39.328-05:002016-04-08T18:36:39.328-05:00Poor Suri! I felt a bit guilty about laughing out ...Poor Suri! I felt a bit guilty about laughing out loud but, eh. <br /><br />You will recall perhaps that I 'heard' Marin Alsop Saturday-- she was music director here from '86 to '99, something like that. Apparently she was known also then for being an exponent of the modern! the new! the progessive! & for favoring all of that over the old decrepit classical warhorses &c &c. & evidently at some level the Eugene audience was receptive to that line, & in any case over time an empathy begins to exist, whether one agrees with specific programming decisions or not... anyway, the point is that while everyone seemed to be happy that she was back on the podium, I had to wonder how many actually listened to her jocular mockery of what I'm describing in shorthand as 'the old', with its implicit denigration of the classical 'canon' and the seasons' content of most symphony orchestras (including Eugene's)-- epater les bourgeois while they're a captive audience, and convince them to love it, too! She was perfectly polite & gracious (of course), after the concert, I mean, & I didn't have the courage to ask her about any of this nor would it have been appropriate in the circumstances. We have to repeat the phrases taught us by the cultural hegemons, whether we actually believe them or think they're nonsense.Marc in Eugenehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04331547981498637474noreply@blogger.com