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"My friend makes the valid point that there's nothing wrong with teaching atonality along with all the other techniques and schools and traditions in music. The problem is requiring composition students to work only within that tradition. It's laughable that this is still considered the "avant garde," when obviously it has become the establishment."
Yep, this is a more reasonable approach to the topic, you don't deny the value of atonality. However you DO seem insistent about this "establishment" where atonality rules. I'm an upper-class composition student at a major university... I don't have to compose "atonal" music.
I am encouraged to explore areas of composition where diatonic tonality, itself a concept newer than western music on the whole, is not as much of a driving force, eg: V doesn't have to lead to I, and so on.
BUT- I am REQUIRED to write in very strictly defined styles when I take a class like, say: writing romantic period lieder. A class I am currently taking requires students to write in a specific style analogous to that of new work from around 1830-50.
As for "atonality" being considered the avant-garde, I don't know what to say to that, I don't think about what's "avante garde," only self-conscious self-promoting hacks are interested in how their work is categorized by others, any further than to distance themselves from schools they specifically dislike. To worry about my music being seen as this or that or the other? That sounds like a stupid marketing issue I could care less about.
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Just be very careful that your not one of those "self-conscious self-promoting hacks who are interested in how their work is categorized by others" type of person. If you do you will end up like me, a very bitter middle-aged person who hates the world and is always yelling at the neighborhood kids to get of my lawn.
But, keep in mind you have to be categorized. That's human nature. It will happen to you because we as humans need to be able to catalogue all of this information that we absorb day to day in to our brains. So whether it is marketing, academia, or OSC, you will be categorized. I would suspect that it would help you find your audience. The problem is having your music teachers categorize you into something you have no interesting in. Of course that's not a good thing but it is a lot of what academia has done to many of us.
As for "avant-garde", atonality was the "avant-garde" back in the 1920-50's. The trouble is that, despite the direction academia is going with new uses for the term "avant-garde", (what ever it means now-a-days) there are still many who are stuck in the 1950's and still trying to make the old "avant-garde" work and still think of it as avant-garde. Academia has ruined the term anyway. They have spent so long trying to teach "avant-garde" as a particular style that the term is no longer meaningful. Even in the late 1980's they were referring to "avant-garde" as a style much the same way the term "classical" is used to categorize music made by an orchestra as apposed to an electric guitar and a "beat-box".
When I lived in Utah the music director in the church I went to out there had gotten his Doctorate degree from and taught at Indiana University School of music before he retired in the late 1970's That's a big deal school for music I though to my self so I decided to ask him if he would offer lessons. After a few weeks I found that it was a mistake. I could do nothing right. If I were not going to be writing in the "avant-garde" style of the 1950's then I would never be taken seriously. Well at least he would never take me seriously. I don't need to be categorized that like.
But what the hell do I know? Only that I'm a bitter middle-aged person who has had much of my knack for melody destroyed by the academic world whom I had blindly put my trust. Of course, I was a lot younger and stupider in those days. How was I supposed to know that I had the right to think for myself? Academia surly didn't want me to do that and I sure as hell wasn't going to question that for heaven's sake. I was getting tuition wavers for my "excellent" work and I wasn't about to risk that!
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quote:Originally posted by Steev: Just be very careful that your not one of those "self-conscious self-promoting hacks who are interested in how their work is categorized by others" type of person. If you do you will end up like me, a very bitter middle-aged person who hates the world and is always yelling at the neighborhood kids to get of my lawn.
Get ready to be Shocked. I was BORN in 1985.
I don't think OSC has a fair conception of what it means to have been born in that year, or in any year before say, his own birthyear.
What I mean is that I grew up and have lived in a world where the term avante-garde is meaningless. I quite honestly don't understand its significance; I have heard it used as a mockingly derogatory term, a term to describe the unlikely or unexpected, etc, but the meaning of the word is lost on me.
Perhaps if I had the perspective OSC has, and could track more of my own life through the perspective of one nearly 3 times my age, I might have more respect for his opinion on this matter. But as it stands, my respect for the man is the only thing that makes it important to me to try and understand him. OSC often writes about how we term things, and then use those terms in the wrong contexts, or term things and then twist the words so they mean something different, then we use that description against people. He's doing this here: he's ressurecting a mode of thinking, an idiom and a terminology which I can honestly say, shocking though it may be, I have never heard used in a serious discussion. I talk to artists/musicians all day and never hear the word avante-garde or any other self mocking expressions I see in the movies.
Its wierd maybe, but I feel like my life is pretty disconnected from people's pre-conceptions about "modern" music. I went home at Christmas and was shocked by extended family member's views about "what Lloyd is up to." Its wierd, but I don't really understand what they think I sit around doing in school. They think I somehow glean knowledge by sitting in the dark and copying notes from a professor talking into a microphone to 1,000 sleepy students. That is a small part of university life, especially when your education gets more specialized, and I was somewhat dismayed that they would think I am somehow being programmed into a professional of somekind like a person who's taking a Ham radio course on saturday afternoons. These are the same people who's conception of College is a set of four years of sitting in lectures, where are the end someone hands you a peice of paper and you are born again a college graduate, they don't get that its what you PUT INTO IT that counts.
Point is, "Academia," or whatever, is not big tweed machine brainwashing the young and ultra-sensitive artist. Only the highly impressionable, and the lazy go through university like this.
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Get ready to be Shocked. I was BORN in 1985. ... ... Perhaps if I had the perspective OSC has, and could track more of my own life through the perspective of one nearly 3 times my age, I might have more respect for his opinion on this matter. ... ... Its wierd maybe, but I feel like my life is pretty disconnected from people's pre-conceptions about "modern" music. I went home at Christmas and was shocked by extended family member's views about "what Lloyd is up to." Its wierd, but I don't really understand what they think I sit around doing in school. They think I somehow glean knowledge by sitting in the dark and copying notes from a professor talking into a microphone to 1,000 sleepy students. ... ... Point is, "Academia," or whatever, is not big tweed machine brainwashing the young and ultra-sensitive artist. Only the highly impressionable, and the lazy go through university like this.
Hey Orincoro, get off my lawn! Dang kids these days.
It's really easy to gain the perspective of OSC. What he says is simple. Maybe a bit over generalized but simple. Relate it to a situation in your life that has similar characteristics and it will start to make sense.
Ask yourself why you have disconnected yourself from these people so much? Are they disconnected from your life or are you disconnected from their life? They don't seem to understand you. They probably don't care to either. Does it mater?
When I was in School my grandmother would ask me what I was doing in college about every other month. After explaining what I was doing her response was, "Why the hell don't you go out and get a real job instead of wasting your time with school!" (Oh the irony.) I decided to get to know her more. To understand her past and what it was, over the course of 75 years of living, which would lead her to come to that conclusion? It took awhile but I now understand completely why she said that. I completely disagree with her but I do empathize.
As for "Academia" or whatever, I'm glad that the school you're attending isn't stuck in the old days. It may have just been the fact that my professors were all in their 60's. No young blood in that department. No one willing to accept "fresh" and "new" ideas. No one cared. Lots of Music majors changed to other majors after their third year back then. I was one of them.
Orincoro, I get the sense that you're statement about highly impressionable and lazy people is merely to make yourself feel better by passing judgments on other people. What makes you an expert on what other people go though? Are you really empathizing or just flattering yourself?
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His view of music precisely matches my view on art.
It took me years to realize that I could make things that I considered beautiful without worrying about what the university establishment considered contemporary.
All the new artists look the same to me.
I like to imagine that I am creating something unique and relevant that the general public can relate to. It also has the added benefit of not trying to be edgy. Plus, I don't have to be ironic or paint disturbing images.
I really enjoyed Card's essay on the topic, even if my interpretation was more about the Art world as opposed to the Music world.
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To slightly derail, aarand, I have to agree; my two-year-old draws pictures that I think have more meaning and artistic merit than some of the new "artists" on the market whose only goal is to be "edgy" and make a "statement".
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Orincoro, I get the sense that you're statement about highly impressionable and lazy people is merely to make yourself feel better by passing judgments on other people. What makes you an expert on what other people go though? Are you really empathizing or just flattering yourself? [/QB]
You know I hadn't thought about that. Its a good question too because I think I was removing myself from the equation. I am slightly lazy in fact, and somewhat impressionable, but I see these qualities as inherently negative and common to everyone. I can see why that looks like self-flattery to you, except that I was sort of including a part of myself in with this lot of lazy impressionable people, and thinking that's not what I WANT to be.
But, maybe I am, since I'm not attentive enough to disguise my arrogance, or strong willed enough to to really believe what I say... hmmm.
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I really enjoyed Card's essay on the topic, even if my interpretation was more about the Art world as opposed to the Music world.
Even if you think of the these two "worlds" as different entities, I don't think you make a fair generalization about either. I don't know your art, but I do know that the intention of "modern" or post-modern art is not to "be edgy," as ketchup writes. Perhaps it is the personal goal of an individual to be whatever the public percieves as "edgy," but I think far more often the public draws conclusions as to motive, based on the work's actual reception. The motive is one thing, the results are going to be different. This is the real heart of what I think makes a "great" peice of art or music, it communicates the intent as correctly and completely as possible. If the INTENT were to shock and disgust, and the work did that, then it is in a way, successful.
In another way, if a composer/artist's work is designed to be hated, then successful doesn't mean popularity, and therefore, successful does not even mean "good" to most people. There is a reason why "it can be interpreted differently by anyone," is an unnacceptable answer in any competent art/music school, art/music is meant to be a vehicle for intent, if the intent is good, and the result is successful, then you will have "good art" IMO.
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You're right, the intent may not be to create something shocking, disturbing, or ugly, but rather to convey a deep feeling of the artist. Sadly, the way that artist has been taught to convey the message is through work that often times is not visually or aurally pleasant to the common man.
Art becomes less about communicating to humanity and more about communicatiing to other artists who have the same type of education.
The communication exists only in a very specific sub-culture and has increasingly little relevance to the average joe.
Back in the day, when the Impressionists were dong their thing, there were far more people following art (on a comparative scale) than there are today, from more strata of social society. this is why there was such a reaction to their work!
This is why an artist could be taken to court because the plaintiff felt that the artist didn't put in enough hours to create their work.
New movements excited the public and Impressionism was no different. The problem is that the artists, and the art community became so focussed on making something 'new' and 'different' that they turned inward, like the wasp-like architecture in Gibson's Neuromancer, and left the public behind.
Now they roll their eyes because most people prefer to look at something that looks like something.
I'm not saying new art isn't valid. Sure it is.
It just doesn't speak to very many people, and therefore fails at being an expression of the larger culture.
I'm not saying that should be the artist's goal, I'm simply saying that the training most artist's receive these days pretty much guarantee that the only way they will survive on their art is to be wards of the state, relying on one grant to the next bestowed by the government.
The reason this is a problem is that the viewing or listening public is cheated out of quite a few great minds. Composers and painters and sculptors who could make the soul sing and the heart soar instead get mired in atonalilities, post-impressionistic, deconstructed pieces that will never be truly appreciated.
It's a loss to all of us.
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Art becomes less about communicating to humanity and more about communicatiing to other artists who have the same type of education.
The communication exists only in a very specific sub-culture and has increasingly little relevance to the average joe. .
Now they roll their eyes because most people prefer to look at something that looks like something.
I'm not saying new art isn't valid. Sure it is.
It just doesn't speak to very many people, and therefore fails at being an expression of the larger culture.
It's a loss to all of us.
Well if you really believe that about artists and composers today, I think your way off base. The intent, and I am sorry to those who have heard me say this time and again, is NOT to alienate the listeners. This is something OSC alleged in his article, that the composer throws fruit at the listener, I think that perhaps the listener feels attacked by the new work because it is a challenge to traditional perception. ALL new work is similarly challenging, you can bet your milk money that alot of people hated impressionism when it was "in vogue." Mozart himself was seen as a washed up child-star in his later years, and Beethoven's 9th recieved a cold reception(literally). In his day, the 9th symphony was popular most among composers, and only through the molding of later works by his successors, did we gain insight into the 9th's importance and beauty.
This average joe argument, is frankly insulting.
OSC uses it fairly often, and though it seems, just seems, to be a self-effacing nod to the academic, it is in fact an attempt to place the "average joe" on a moral high-ground, noble and pure of spirit, beyond pretentious thought and action. This is in itself a pretentious loud of hooey, which only serves to alienate the specialist who attempts to give his own life some meaning by the study of his field.
The "average joe" statement basically says to all those who specialize and become experts: "What you do is unimportant to me, therefore you are wasting your time; you are of no value." I understand that the average person doesn't specialize xy AND Z, but in only X or Y, but this is true of EVERYONE EVERYWHERE! Therefore calling YOURSELF the "average joe" is a subtle attempt to other the expert and ostricize him from your "average crowd."
People feel alienated by artists? Artists ARE alienated by people.
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quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: ... OSC uses it fairly often, and though it seems, just seems, to be a self-effacing nod to the academic, it is in fact an attempt to place the "average joe" on a moral high-ground, noble and pure of spirit, beyond pretentious thought and action. This is in itself a pretentious loud of hooey, which only serves to alienate the specialist who attempts to give his own life some meaning by the study of his field. ... People feel alienated by artists? Artists ARE alienated by people.
And isn't that what we are doing to each other in this thread? OSC is the "average Joe". He is expressing to us how he sees it. Despite if it's true or not that is how he sees it. Shouldn't it be a lesson to us to realize the "average Joe" has some how gotten the wrong impression and we should at least reach out to change that impression? Not by arguing or lecturing or bitching about how someone is being a jerk but by examining yourself and making sure you are in tune with the people around you so as to avoid falling into the stereotype that the "average Joe" is complaining about in the first place?
I don't think artists alienate themselves intentionally by the aesthetic they create. It's takes at least two people to create alienation. We all have personalities with certain attractions to certain aesthetics and we attract people who share those aesthetics and repel those that don't. We feel alienated by those that don't because many of them say mean things. Many of those rude people don't have the maturity level to recognize their anti-social behavior either. So what do we do? We fire back mean things. That gets us nowhere fast. Just look at politics today. There is a way to reach people at their level of maturity without stooping to their level of immaturity.
I have to communicate with people every day and I find myself in the middle of silly squabbles because people would rather say mean things to each other rather than understand each other's point of view.
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Orson Scott Card is an artist and an average joe.
So am I.
I am currently guest curating a show for the Art Gallery of Alberta, and so I've been giving this a lot of thought.
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quote:Originally posted by aarand: Orson Scott Card is an artist and an average joe.
So am I.
Yah, that's my point! EVERYBODY is an average joe.
You want to talk about partical physics? cause when it comes to that subject we are both "average joes" right?
My point is we don't look ascance at the particle physicist and say: "Your work just doesn't appeal to me, I'm the common man." The physicist is just as common a guy as anyone, and the artist is too, so saying that YOU'RE the average joe doesn't really signify.
Yes your the common man, but so am I, so is ANYONE ANYWHERE! We are all products of the same society and thus we all fill a place in it. Ostricising one person or another by saying that he isn't the average guy, places him in a position outside your group, not a member of your village. If this were true, if every wayward artist were truly individual, then what need would he or she have of ANY contact with the "average" simpletons of the world? The fact that artists attempt to communicate is proof that they belong as a part of the fabric of our lives. I am as average as you.
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Aha, but the particle physicist IS publishing papers on behalf of the general public. The number of people who actually read the Einstein papers on the photo-electric effect, brownian motion, and special relativity when they were first published is infinitesimily small compared to the number of people who benefited almost directly from his work. The entire world was drastically effected.
Point is, the readership at publication, the intended audience or the market that the artist works in can start small, that doesn't mean anything.
I don't conflate simpleton with average joe. I deny the existance of the average joe and the simpleton entirely; if I refer to a simpleton, I only do so ironically.
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