Tradition as Foundation

I live in a small city in central Mexico that has a large expat population which makes for an interesting blend. They are re-doing the high street just around the corner from where I live. Here is a photo of the incomplete construction:

Yes, that's a cobblestone street. In fact, most roads in the countryside are also made with cobblestones. There is some use of concrete to embed the stones in, but this is mostly the same method of road construction used by the Roman legions. The advantage for modern Mexican workers is that you can do a street or a road without heavy equipment. Two guys and a wheelbarrow pretty much does it.

Now mind you, that surface conceals a modern sewage system and fibre-optic internet connections, but still the basic structure is thousands of years old. When I was a student in Spain I watched them re-do a cobblestone street in a similar way, though they used different stones.

Mexico has cultural traditions that are also very old--sadly, I don't know as much about them as I might.

What's my point here? As a composer I am always looking for a new kind of expression or a new way of expressing something, but the truth is that there is a relation between innovation and tradition and that relation is akin to that of foundation and superstructure. Stuff needs to be founded on other stuff, preferably solid and long-standing. But, you know, I don't think of this when I am composing. But after I have written something I often notice that it has roots--perhaps not very evident, but they are there. I think that Schoenberg was experiencing a similar process when he would go back and attempt to analyze something he had newly written in an attempt to "justify" it. I don't think that way at all, but I do think that creations that have aesthetic substance often have roots--sometimes very deep ones.

The Rite of Spring is a good example, but so is a lot of Stravinsky. Of course, he went to some pains to conceal the roots.