{"id":9450,"date":"2013-10-27T10:57:22","date_gmt":"2013-10-27T09:57:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.nmz.de\/badblog\/?p=9450"},"modified":"2013-10-27T10:58:54","modified_gmt":"2013-10-27T09:58:54","slug":"i-am-reading-the-classical-revolution-by-john-borstlap-and-think-about-it-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.nmz.de\/badblog\/2013\/10\/27\/i-am-reading-the-classical-revolution-by-john-borstlap-and-think-about-it-5\/","title":{"rendered":"I am reading „The Classical Revolution“ by John Borstlap and think about it (5)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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diesmal: im Frankfurter Flughafen kurz vor dem Flug nach Mexiko<\/p><\/div>\n

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The Fallacy of Modernism II: The Attack upon Music<\/strong><\/p>\n

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This is Borstlap\u2019s most controversial chapter so far. In German we would say \u201che pulls his pants down\u201d, meaning that he is revealing his pet hatreds for certain composers (especially Boulez, who he constantly criticizes for being extremely shallow and simple while hiding it under a layer of clever wordplay). These are the most important concepts of this chapter in a nutshell:<\/span><\/p>\n

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1)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span>\u201cSonic Art\u201d (what the rest of the world is calling \u201ccontemporary music\u201d) is not music, and to think so is letting barbarians reign in art.<\/span><\/p>\n

2)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span>\u201cSonic Art\u201d is materialistic through and through and its widespread academic conquest of the world is equal to opening another McDonalds restaurant. <\/span><\/p>\n

3)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span>\u201cInnocents\u201d (i.e. children) should be protected from efforts of selling \u00a0<\/span>\u201csonic art\u201d as \u201ceducation projects\u201d as these are no introductions to music at all but to something else. <\/span><\/p>\n

4)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span>To be a \u201csonic artist\u201d no musical talent is required, and therefore most current \u201cNew Music\u201d is atrociously bad. <\/span><\/p>\n

5)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span>Being outwardly \u201cmodern\u201d and \u201cavant-garde\u201d is in fact being extremely conservative, na\u00efve and even hostile to the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

6)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span>Originality is misunderstood as a concept: there is no danger to be derivative if it is an expression of an individual and authentic emotion.<\/span><\/p>\n

7)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span>Brahms is a good composer.<\/span><\/p>\n

And now I will say something quite radical as well: I agree (except 1) and 3) and the use of the word \u201cSonic Art\u201d to describe \u201cclassical\u201d avant-garde music) with most of the above. But that is because Borstlap mostly describes the malaise he perceives in this chapter instead of droning on about his solution: traditional tonality and a return to \u201cgood old values of music\u201d, with which I wholeheartedly disagree.<\/span><\/p>\n

And here are some radical quotes, for your enjoyment:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIn fact, modernist \u201ccomposers\u201d of today, like Helmut Lachenmann with his death cult, Brian Ferneyhough with his horror vacui, and Elliott Carter with his \u201ccelebration\u201d of modern life, are the real conservatives\u2026.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026like the German sound artist Jörg Widmann, who sells his nicely polished, harmless trade to handfuls of equally adapted sonic listeners, although it cannot find much of a sympathetic ear (\u2026.) where it is compared with music.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWolfgang Rihm\u2019s mostly hollow neo-expressionism with its quasi melodramatic gestures in which the location of the notes do not matter.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cIt is rather tragic to think of someone [referring to Boulez] who first wants to destroy something and then tries to glue the splinters together\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\u201c[state funded] \u201crevolutionary spirit\u201d is bourgeois through-and-through\u2026.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cTo be a sonic artist, however, musical talents are not required, and this explains the sheer number of \u201cmodern composers\u201d and \u201ccomposition students\u201d\u00a0 <\/span>everywhere in the Western world\u2026.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

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I do not agree with all of the above sentiments, but I have to admit that I admire Borstlap\u2019s guts to say so, as he is right in his assessment that most contemporary music critics would not even dare to write anything of the above out of angst to be seen as \u201cbackwards\u201d or \u201cconservative\u201d. But I would actually think that many of the above-mentioned could actually profit from some critical words here and there \u2013 they would improve their already impressive music instead of constantly bathing them in uninhibited praise, which is never really good for an artist in the long run. <\/span><\/p>\n

And speaking of a dramatic lack of musical talent in many young composers \u2013 he is not completely wrong (and I say this with some experience of entry exams and their development in the last decades). And if I read some current reviews of for example the last Donaueschingen festival, I find there is a huge gap between how it is presented in the feuilletons of the big newspaper (gushing and non-critical, to politically protect the always financially endangered Donaueschingen) and the more honest reviews of visiting young composers like Mathias Monrad Moller.<\/span><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t want to argue who is more right in this case, but the gap is perceptible to everybody. I assume similar strategies are at work in Borstlap\u2019s home country, the Netherlands, whose system of music funding has come under heavy attack recently and is therefore also feverishly defended. <\/span><\/p>\n

The strange thing: in this \u2013 his most provocative chapter so far \u2013 I agree with Borstlap the most, and mostly for the most important point he makes and which I have not yet mentioned above yet:<\/span><\/p>\n

Why is the \u201ctraditional\u201d \u00a0<\/span>avant-garde constantly writing the most clever books, educated people again and again from a younger and younger age,\u00a0 <\/span>and \u2013 most importantly – constantly defending itself and its merits (this is going on for roughly 100 years) when in fact it is becoming a more and more a marginalized phenomenon of musical culture?<\/span><\/p>\n

Please note the carefully phrased term \u201ctraditional avant-garde\u201d, I am not speaking of New Music in general.<\/span><\/p>\n

Food for thought.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Moritz Eggert<\/span><\/p>\n

(to be continued)<\/span><\/p>\n

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