Would that be the philosophy of Nietzsche? Nietzsche and Wagner reunited under National Socialism? Talk about Hegelian Dialectic — where the thesis and anti(Christ)thesis had a big falling out — leading to Nazi synthesis. Today they would be the equivalent of Blues Brothers with a dead God in tow. Classical music has taken a beating.
I agree Tchaikovsky mangles the sonata form but the music didn’t suffer with his “music first, form later” approach. Brahms is more like a well oil and fine tuned touring machine with all the internal parts just clicking along. If you appreciate complex structure and deep relations Brahms (and Bach) is the ticket.
Berg and Webern adapted the Wagner-Schoenberg traits but opted for Brahmsian brevity, while Bartok and Kodaly tried a different blend of components.
I wonder if modern compositional practices really chuck out the baby with the bath water. The dissonance of a new language — say Schoenberg’s serialism as a new non musical means of organizing sound — really can’t be a substitute for ideas that are born from tonality. Certain qualities cannot be expressed. Unless, that is, you re-tune the human ear. Which they are trying to do but haven’t succeeded. For example, dissonance resolving to less dissonance doesn’t cut it for a modern resolution in the same way tonality resolves. If I can use an analogy, modern music is like a lover trying to express feelings of love with words that have all the vowel sounds removed. All he is left with are consonants. It’s a harsh, edgy, angular sound. It’s not a full vocabulary or language.
Today's modern music is something else. I hear of a guy writing a symphony using some bug that gave off a high pitched sound by scratching their legs. There wouldn't be anybody left in the audience... yes, cricket sounds would be all that you'd hear.
Tchaikovsky’s music was gay, but also Brahms’. He described Brahms as a bearded lady.
Is it true that Tchaikovsky danced with Saint Saiens... and at the YMCA? ;-)
Hitler was not much of an original thinker. He cribbed from Nietzsche and Houston Joseph Chamberlain, stole from Vienna mayor Karl Lüger -- and then tried to package Mein Kampf as some profound new revelation. It was just old (poisoned) wine in a new bottle.
The Wagner connection stems from Hitler's understanding of political theater, no doubt coming from time spent spellbound at Bayreuth. Take a look at old newsreels of Nazi funerals. They are staged to look like the entrance of the gods into Valhalla from Das Rheingold. The mass rallies had a sense of the last scene of Die Meistersinger but with all the people in uniform. Hitler thought he was making a connection with the great German past as filtered through Wagner.
Today's modern music is something else.
I have good news. The younger generation of composers has returned to melody, classical form and tonality. Check out recent works by Ron Coleman, Jeffrey Cotton, Ronn Yedidia and Patrick Zimmerli, many of which we have commissioned for the Seattle Chamber Music Society.