I want to tell you about my grad applications, and how I've had music grad school (almost) "beaten" out of me by double parent guilt-tripping and other factors, and how I've had composer's block for 1.5 weeks now, and how I want to conduct/teach some ensemble somewhere. But I have a headache. And I don't want to think about it.
Instead, I'll philosophize.
Wikipedia says that there are 3000 to 6000 languages spoken in the world today. (Excellent accuracy, wikipedia.) Let's take one of those languages. English. Within the world's English speaking population, there are so many different accents, jargons, and semantics to take into account. But we can divide those different modes of expression into "genres."
Those genres can be grouped into elite and popular. Take the UK, for example. So many different dialects exist between Edinburgh and London, but Jafaican and Cockney dialects are considered popular, and your proper Queen's English is elite. To us in America, we're aware of this twofold distinction and notsomuch of the hundred or so different UK dialects.
Ask any musician. Music is a language. We study the theory of its grammar, listen to Horowitz's and Richter's expert readings of classic novels by famous authors like Chopin and Bach, and try to write our own speeches and short stories. However, we have a problem. Elite music aka classical music is dying.
Why?
Partly, because we consider it "elite!"
Creative Writing majors don't study James Patterson as much as they do James Joyce - if they do at all! Similarly, pianists aren't listening to Ligeti as much as they are Beethoven. Classical music concerts need to program pre-Stravinsky or no one will show up.
Conversely, I was listening to some Police song from the early 80s and my sister said something to the effect of "That's so old." New is always "in" when dealing with popular music. It's always regenerating. And at a ridiculously rapid rate! Therefore, it's stays alive.
The same cannot be said for classical music, because a paradigm has been created within this genre of music due to it's self-ascribed "elitism." Here's my theory:
The famous composers, the ones that have to be played in concert halls now in order to get attendees, are the ones who pushed the envelope and revolutionized their field in the past.
Beethoven shook things up so much that all of the Europe was in writer's block after he died. Who would be the next Beethoven? Schumann published in his newspaper that Brahms was going to be the next Beethoven. Brahms was so scared of messing up, that he didn't write his first symphony until 23 years later, and it might as well have been Beethoven's Tenth.
Wagner, egomaniac and crazy man, called himself the future of music and "created" the musical drama. He saw himself as the only person capable of building upon what Beethoven was trying to achieve in his Ninth Symphony. Again pushing the envelope.
Fast-forward a couple years, Rachmaninoff's critics called him Tchaikovsky 2.0. Not edgy enough. Not saying anything new. Stravinsky had 3 different periods in which he'd push envelopes in all kinds of different ways. Gershwin transfered jazz from the realm of the popular to the "elite" halls of classical music. Bartók, Barber, Ravel are all pushing, pushing. Webern, Schoenberg, Berg, all pushing. And so if you listen to the latter group's twelve tone expressionism, you might wonder "how do you push further than that?"
In the popular realm, it's not a matter of pushing as it is a matter of making it fresh. Recycling old materials to a modern audience who's never heard it before is still making it fresh. Kanye West samples Elton John and Daft Punk in his work and he's praised!
The atmosphere of classical music is such that I would feel uncomfortable if I borrowed significantly from a composer of the past. I'm not saying it wouldn't be appreciated. It might just be viewed as sophomoric or passe as if I have nothing new to say.
Now I should clarify that it's not that bad. I talked to a moderately well-known composer this summer who said that it used to be that one could not get into a school of music without serial/atonal compositions. Since the minimalist revolution, it seems that eclecticism is the spirit of the times. Anything goes. We're down to individual preferences. Is that good?
Yes and no.
I'm glad that tonal music isn't being shunned, at least not by everyone. I'm glad that tonal folk are also starting to appreciate the atonal works (me included). But, it is further proof that classical music will die in the next 50 years. Why?
There is a story in the Bible of the Tower of Babel. The people wanted to build a tower high enough to reach God. They kept pushing and pushing. God thought that this was stupid and wanted to humble them. They were all speaking the same language, so God gave them different languages. When someone said, "Pass me the hammer!" The other person said, "Que?! Que es un 'hammer'?" French, Urdu, Cantonese, Tagalog, Spanish, German all over the place. No one could understand each other. So they grouped with those who spoke their language and dispersed. The tower construction stopped and became ruins.
We're all speaking different languages in classical music. So classical music will stop and become ruins. Classical music is currently on life-support and at any moment, we will unknowingly pull the plug...
Ok. :(
Sorry for the depressing philosophizing today. I'll think happier thoughts between now and next time. :) Au revoir, Auf Wedersehen, Ciao, Goodbye!
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