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Posted on 09/16/2020 8:22:21 PM PDT by libh8er
Has the 19th-century German composer Ludwig van Beethoven become a modern symbol of "exclusion and elitism" for rich, white men?
In an article published by Vox on Tuesday that quoted New York Philharmonic clarinetist Anthony McGill, writers Nate Sloan and Charlie Harding argued that the work has been propped up by white, wealthy men, whose embrace of the musical composition stood as a symbol of "their superiority and importance."
Vox is not the only left-leaning outlet pushing to examine the racial makeup of classical music composers. In July, the New York Times published a lengthy article that accused the world of classical music of failing to address racism.
"With their major institutions founded on white European models and obstinately focused on the distant past, classical music and opera have been even slower than American society at large to confront racial inequity," read the New York Times's article.
"For others — women, LGBTQ+ people, people of color — Beethoven’s symphony is predominantly a reminder of classical music’s history of exclusion and elitism," Sloan and Harding wrote.
The writers suggested that because Beethoven was white and most other classical musicians are white, classical music has become a form of "exclusion, elitism, and gatekeeping" for black and brown people.
“As you perpetuate the idea that the giants of the music all look the same, it conveys to the other that there’s not a stake in that music for them,” classical music critic James Bennett II told Vox.
McGill struck a more measured tone, suggesting that an overemphasis on Beethoven's work keeps new musicians and ideas from being fully appreciated in real time.
McGill said, “If you pretend like there’s no other music out there, that Beethoven is the greatest music that ever will matter,” then new listeners will not feel welcome in the genre.
I guess there isnt enough references to b!tches, whores, n!ggas, and not enough f bombs in it to make it valid in today’s society/culture.
“Susan McClary was awarded a MacArthur Foundation’s “genius grant.” “
Private foundations, established by wealthy benefactors, have a history of being cooped by leftist administrators who modify the organization’s mission, after the death of the benefactor, and use the money to support leftist social activism. For example, the Carnegie foundation, set up to build libraries across the US, hasn’t constructed a library in the US since the 1950’s.
It is time to end the tax exemption of private foundations after a period of time (say 20 years) and require the foundation to liquidate at that time its remaining funds to the federal treasury where the funds will be used for the express purpose of paying down the national debt.
It is unconscionable foundations are exempt from taxes while using the financial advantage of tax exempt status to destroy our culture and nation.
“Susan McClary was awarded a MacArthur Foundation’s “genius grant.” “
Private foundations, established by wealthy benefactors
, have a history of being cooped by leftist administrators who modify the organization’s mission, after the death of the benefactor, and use the money to support leftist social activism. For example, the Carnegie foundation, set up to build libraries across the US, hasn’t constructed a library in the US since the 1950’s.
It is time to end the tax exemption of private foundations after a period of time (say 20 years) and require the foundation to liquidate at that time its remaining funds to the federal treasury where the funds will be used for the express purpose of paying down the national debt.
It is unconscionable foundations are exempt from taxes while using the financial advantage of tax exempt status to destroy our culture and nation.
What is happening worldwide is that whites won’t breed - so they are a shrinking population everywhere, taking sh!t from the Thirdworlders they’ve imported into their countries.
Roll over Beethoven and tell Tchaikovsky the news. Yous two guys are racist.
A barbarian is a barbarian.
If these race-obsessed folks want a “conversation” so bad let’s include rap.
And there are two kinds of people in the world: people who love music and those who don’t.
Nat King Cole
The Platters
Keely Smith
Aretha Franklin
on and on ...
I never cared for Ella because of that scat stuff.
Oh, go to hell, you fascist commies! The long march through the institutions is now hitting my beloved classical music. Liberals destroy everything they touch.
You describe exactly an experience my wife and I had a good, long time ago -- maybe 20 years ago, perhaps more. We were offered tickets to the Kennedy Center for the finals of a national competition for modern "classical" composers. We are not musically sophisticated but it was an interesting one-off opportunity and we were happy to go socialize with our friends.
Three pieces were performed. One was at least recognizably "music." It wasn't very good, at least to my ears; I certainly would have no desire to listen to it again. But it had a structure and melodies and the instruments played together -- you know, sophisticated musical stuff like that. Another piece was just sounds with no apparent structure at all. The tempo varied from time to time, though not in any pattern that I could translate into a narrative, and the instruments at least blended somewhat; I thought that parts of it might serve as a soundtrack for a movie, as background tones to set a mood. I don't know exactly what a "tone poem" is supposed to be, but it occurred to me that this might have been an attempt in that direction. The final piece was just noise: no structure, no harmony, no tempo, just jarring, grating noise. It was ugly and painful for the sake of being ugly and painful. I don't recall if the audience actually booed or hissed; we may have.
After the performances, there was a short intermission to allow the judges to make their decision. The audience adjourned to the lobby. Our little group instantly agreed that we would rank the pieces in the order I've described them. We also guessed that the judges would award the prize to the third piece, which we all hated. We overheard several other conversations in the lobby. Every one of those groups was expressing the same views. And of course, we were exactly correct.
Pure deconstruction won the prize. This is what happens when institutions are taken over by people who have no commitment to excellence or to being conservators of a great tradition. As in other disciplines in the arts, too many people in positions of institutional authority value novelty for the sake of novelty, have nothing but contempt for the canon, and think they demonstrate their sophistication by insulting theater or museum goers naive enough to attend in the hope of seeing or hearing something of grace and beauty.
The Taliban will have to hustle to destroy our cultural institutions, because the museum curators and musical directors are apt to do it first.
A blast from the past - my take on a piece of modern music I wrote a decade or so ago. Since I wrote this I have found the film that the piece in question is a soundtrack to and in that setting it works.
The Cleveland Orchestra preforms Dream/Window by TÅru Takemitsu
A review 9/26/2010
I was riding in my car with the radio tuned to WCLV. It was announced that the Cleveland Orchestra would be playing a work by TÅru Takemitsu. Shirley and I looked at each other and we each said “Who?”. Perhaps it would have been better had I remained ignorant of this composer
A few days later, WCLV broadcast the entire performance. It appears that TÅru Takemitsu was commissioned by a Kyoto bank, or perhaps an industrial firm or civic institution to write a piece celebrating the city. I cannot help but think, that, upon hearing this work, the commissioner would have asked Takemitsu to return the commission and then commit seppuku to atone for the embarrassment he caused not only to the institution but the city and the artist as well.
The piece is entitled Dream/Window and purports to envision the view of a Japanese garden through a window and through the window of a dream. A 55 gallon drum of Windex would have done a great deal to help this piece, as the view from this window at high noon with not a cloud in the sky is darker than that of the deepest twilight, but then, after a good cleaning you would have seen nothing but dead flowers over-run by weeds.
Mind you, I like weird music, very weird music, hell, I make music myself that is so far out of the mainstream that most listeners would run out of the room rather than listen to another moment of one of my works. It gives me hope, though, perhaps someday my noodlings will be given a performance by one of the great orchestras on the planet as they are no worse (or better) than Takematsu’s.
I would probably like this piece by TÅru Takemitsu in another setting, as chill-out music or as a film score. It does not belong at Severance Hall in the company of giants, and, sadly, it was a colossal waste of the talented musicianship found in the Cleveland Orchestra. This is not to say anything bad about the Cleveland Orchestra, as I believe that their true genius shone through in this performance in that they were able to play such execrable music with such virtuosity.
Normally, the orchestra tunes up, the conductor comes on stage and the music starts. I can only assume that the orchestra tuned up beforehand, but after the conductor came on stage and started playing Dream/Window, it sounded like the orchestra was tuning up all over again, not that one could have easily noticed the difference when listening to this piece. This marks the first time that I’ve heard the orchestra tuning up just before the work was over. In fact, I wounder if the orchestra ever stopped tuning up throughout the performance.
Takemitsu was obviously a Trekkie, as in this piece the Enterprise quickly becomes lost in the Nebulous Nebula and nobody can find their way out. Not once did the Captain (or the composer) consult a road map, stop at a gas station to ask directions or use his GPS. While wandering aimlessly through this piece, the listener is, on one occasion, attacked by huge minor chords that go on for far too long, (as did this piece), and is occasionally aware of disembodied bits and pieces of melodies floating by outside the window, but which never stop in and say hello. One just knows that the Atomic Mutant Monsters will be showing up any moment now, and although a little change of pace would have been welcome, sadly, in the end they never did.
“Daddy, Daddy, are we there yet”?
“Shadup ya little So & So or I’ll feed you to Godzilla”
“Oh please do, at least I won’t have to listen to any more of this”.
.....
I understand that. I tend to skip tunes of hers that have too much of that. However, when she really wanted it to be, her voice was liquid gold. All of the folks you mentioned are represented in my playlist. Nat King Cole was amazing vocally. So smooth.
Are they going to attack white toilet paper next???
You think jazz and blues happened in a black folks vacuum
How silly
Funny no jazz or blues in Africa like here
Duh could it be white people influenced them?
Are you doodle dawgs male alter ego?
Same mantra
Exactly, Jazz was taking European instruments and finding new ways to use them.
This is your comment.
replete
[rəˈplēt] filled or well-supplied with something.
nothingness
[ˈnəTHiNGnəs]
NOUN
1. the absence or cessation of life or existence.
"the fear of the total nothingness of death"
2. worthlessness; insignificance; unimportance.
"the nothingness of it all overwhelmed him"
Taken together, your comment is "Minorities histories are filled with worthlessness; insignificance; unimportance."
So, let's backtest you comment vis-a-vis jazz and blues. Those musical genres didn't emanate from white folks, but rather from black folks. If you want to debate that well-settled point, please commence. For now, we'll take it as a given.
Your response intimates that you think blues and jazz are not "filled with worthlessness; insignificance; unimportance." However, if those genres emanated from blacks, your comment would appear to be contradictory.
If you decide to pivot, and argue that those genres reached the level of popularity today because of white influence (this is a supply-side, not demand side discussion), then we can have that discussion. But that evolutionary pathway discussion is a diversion from your original comment.
If you further pivot and try to look to Africa (which is unusual, but it's your post), that may be an interesting debate...but your hypothesis (as best as I can infer it) that blacks in Africa didn't create jazz or blues but blacks in America did, it would suggest that blacks in America are more creative or have greater skills etc that those across the pond. That is, unless you somehow want to argue that jazz and blues came from black Americans because of whites, which is a stretch unless you want to say that maltreatment etc was a good thing for these genres' genesis.
But that is all a diversion to your original supposition, which is that "Minorities histories are filled with worthlessness; insignificance; unimportance." Which, at least with regard to jazz and blues, is at best a stretch.
Thanks for listening. And no, those other FReepers aren't related to me.
Yes Dawg
Tropical African culture stand alone has contributed almost nothing to civilization
And some blacks are butthurt over that and wish to destroy the culture that did civilize the planet
That would be white people from Europe who were mostly dare I admit.....Christians
The fact that troubles you is simply your burden to bear
I can’t help you with it
Other than a virtual shoulder to cry on....
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