YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.

While funniness is subjective, I actually don't think this toccata is funny, apart from the hilarious ending. (Although maybe it helps knowing the "original" this was based on.) Exciting, fresh, "cool", bouncy, surprising, and witty, yes, but not funny. A "dry" humor at best... one that can be perceived as funny if you look at it that way. A "descend into madness" vibe also present, especially in the final climax.

At any rate, I can actually think of a number of compositions...

twooffour 5 months ago

... that capture humor very well.

His Scarlatti etude comes much closer. Several places in his Campanella are pretty hilarious. The middle section in his Triple etude. The FUCKING CIRCUS GALOP is funny as hell.

Then there's stuff like the pizzicato polka, as well as tons of works by Shostakovitch (play those in any class, you're bound to get suppressed laughters until... the suppressing starts to fail), the Badinerie by Bach, a great number of Mozart pieces...

twooffour 5 months ago

... many Alkan works including Chemin le Fer and the Aesop variations (my God, the Aesop variations), Liszt's grand galop, various Chopin etudes... the list goes motherfucking on.

And that not even counting parodies like the Beethoven / River Kwai spoof by Dudley Moore.

And that merely goes for the instrumental music... as soon as you add singers that can do voice impressions, accent imitations and a lot of other tricks... the hilarity can't be stopped.

twooffour 5 months ago

Be it classical aria (Rossini, Mozart), old-school crooner (ever heard of Max Raabe?), rap (Eminem) or rock/metal (you should listen to some System of a Down), not even counting the musical numbers in cabaret and comedy shows (be it something by Monty Python, or Spike Milligan) - humor and hilarity are as abudant in music as any other expression.

But then again, there are always the serious types in the audience, aren't there ;)

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...you are taking my point too simplistically...as usual...obviously there are many examles of the use of music to communicate humorous extramusical content...such as the ones you give...neverheless it is often noted by creative musicians far more pofessionally steeped in the creative side of music than I am..that music as a medium and homor are inherently incompatible.this is a rather old concept...not original with me at all...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

So how are the "inherently incompatible" if humor actually works in music? No, not "extra-musical", but actual absolute instrumental music?

I really wonder what kind of "reasoning" those "professionally steeped musicians" use to make such an absurd claim... or whether you know it yourself.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...the idea is at least a century old...goes back to Schoppenhauer...and was embraced and endorsed by Stravinsky...his Petrouchka, etc. does not contradict it...you can use musical means to "communicate humor'...but since music cannot "communicate anything other than itelf" (Schopenhauer...and Stravinsky, again)..anything so context-sensitive as humor is not really compatible with art music at its most ambitious level...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

So now we've gone from "music" to "instrumental absolute music" to "art music at its most ambitious level" in just a few hours... I love how you're always so sure what your point is!

Hey, when you implied that the incompatibility of music and humor was the reason why this "attempt at musical humor" wasn't particularly funny, did you mean that it failed to be funny due to being too artsy at an ambitious level, or that it failed to be high art due to being humorous (but not funny)?

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...everything Schop. and Strav. said about this does not contradict the fact that composers keep trying..great examples are the symphonies of Mahler and Shostakovich..draw your own conclusions about those...the reason this piano toccata sort of fails is because the composer is not ambitious enough, to my mind...Prokofiev, in his "Sarcasms" was more ambitious...they work better than this...but this thing here is not really disgraceful...were I him, would have put it out..

fredericfranc 5 months ago

"does not contradict the fact that composers keep trying."

Keep trying what?

Because what is certainly a pointless endeavor, is trying to create music that isn't bound to induce some emotional associations in the listener.

The best example of musical "sarcasm" I can think of right now, would be some works by Alkan (especially the 4th movement of the Sonatina).

H' toccata doesn't try to be funny in the first place, in my opinion, but it scores with other virtues.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ..."keep trying"...to communicate humorous content, like Mahl., Shost., Prok. etc,,,rather limited success...but interesting to see how it works out...yeah, you trying to read Schop. would do you some good, I think...a major philosopher here...philosophizing on music...not many of them try it...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

I'd say Shostakovitch had GLORIOUS success, rather than "limited".

You yourself seem to have forgotten everything Schop. ever wrote, because you seem unable to reproduce any argument. Not surprised in the least.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...Shost. himself thought he had "limited success"... obviously depends on "success at what"...at least we are now sending each other to Schop....that is some kind of progress, I guess...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

Well, as I said, humor is fundamentally subjective, so if Shostakovitch found his own compositions unfunny, fair enough for him.

The same goes for any kind of movie or stand-up or impression, though... someone just may not find it funny.

Someone did a presentation about Shostakovitch in the conservatory, and one piece caused continuous laughter through its entire duration.

Hamelin's 12 etude recital that I attended had some people trying to suppress laughter all the time.

twooffour 5 months ago

It just works.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...on Shost. "success" read that collection of interviews with the guy called "The Testament"(?)...also on the humor thing, read Prokofiev's letters, he was really into humor, right?...on the music being unable to express...etc., in addition to your basic Schop., read Stravinsky on Schop.,...after all Strav. was a real composer, he actually had to know what he was talking about, whereas Schop. was only a a philosopher, he was talking about something outside of his professional...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

So what does this have to do with the fact that people can and do find music funny everywhere, all the time? Don't just refer to books - summarize some argument vital to this topic.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...you should be enough of a logician to see that "people finding music funny" does not really help with this "incompatibility" thing, it has to do with the work and experience of a composer trying to do something, etc.,...reading books by composers is extremely educational in various ways...I can't really reproduce that kind of thing here..it has to do with their practice and experience...gotta hear their voices...their words, really to get the flavor-feel of this...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

Oh, it does help, because if a number of people agree on perceiving certain stylistic devices in music as funny, it's a hard-wired (as well as acquired) feature of our brains that can be shared by as well as targeted by a composer.

And if music can express and convey humor, then it's compatible with humor. Seems pretty simple to me, and if you don't have anything to respond to that, you may as well stop arguing.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ..."if a number of people agree..."...no, they don't, it is a matter of psychological expts, so we know nothing about anything "hardwired", you are giving me a totally vacuous "naked assertion" here..."and if music can express and convey humor...", obviously the composers themselves disagree with this, as does Schop., so here you are running around in circles on me...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

"no, they don't, it is a matter of psychological expts"

Yes, just as they don't on the funniness or quality of movies, comedians, or even food.

I've already made this point for you, and what I'm saying is that humor in music is as real and present as humor in any other area, as well as any other emotion or aural impression in music.

(That means, while virtually everyone will find an octave consonant and a 7th dissonant, people will have different opinions on the quality...

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...humor is notoriously hard to pin down, no you cannot pin down funniness in movies at all, and with music it is that much more hopeless...this "psychological-hardwired" stuff, you don't want to get started on that, it just plain does not work, I know more about it than you think, I am an employee of an academic dept. that's into that...just go back to Schopenhauer, you will make out better, and he is a greatt read, better than experimental psychology, I have read too much of it..

fredericfranc 5 months ago

"humor is notoriously hard to pin down"

So that means humor isn't just incompatible with music, it's not compatible with ANYTHING. Congratulations on making such a great point!

Yet somehow, a comedian is able to stand in front of an audience and produce uniform laughters.

Somehow, you can go see a movie and secretly find a line funny, and then go to youtube and find 10 remixes making fun of that line.

It's so hard to "pin down", it's incompatible with anything. Great point.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...you are getting caught here in logical contradictions like crazy...psychological evaluation of responses to art is an intellectual minefield, you don't want to get sucked into this, much too tricky...stick to where we started...Mr.Hamelin's toccata, humor in music, what can music express...go to that philosopher, and the composers on this...lay off the freaking experimental psychology...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

What logical contradictions? Point out one. Or two to make it a plural.

And where did I talk about experimental psychology?

As for the toccata, I've already said it before: I don't find it funny except in a very dry form, and I wouldn't know if it was intended any differently. If it was intended to be funny, I don't respond to that funniness.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...trying to settle essentially philosophical points by experimental psychology is essentially a logical methodological error, a "category" error...this toccata being funny or not does not much to do with anything by now...we are into the more general "what music can do" in general...and I want the composers to try to settle it for you, plus our German philosopher...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

.... about the subject, lest I commit intellectual dishonesty.

Which I don't.

twooffour 5 months ago

Note how the discussion wasn't about analysis, "pinning it down" or "getting to the bottom of it" in any way.

If shared intuition, shared tastes, and shared instincts didn't work well enough to produce something that can be agreed both by creator and audience to induce a certain effect (without having to "pin it down), then the world of comedy and entertainment would be vastly different from what it is now.

Which is really my whole and sole point - while you have none.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ..."if shared iintuition, shared tastes...did not work well enough, etc...."...this is an intellectual minefield, you basically want to get the perspective of our philosopher, and the composers on this...will cure you of all this simplistic thinking...I can't cure you of that instantly, it takes "an education"...you get a semblance of that from these hi-flying guys...you leave behind thhis "common-sense psychological thinking" once and for all...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

I don't wanna be lectured by a pretentious pseudo-intellectual who can do nothing but point to statements by famous philosophers and composers, while obviously having no comprehension of their work himself, thank you very much.

Seems like you wanted to express that you didn't find this piece funny, but instead of just saying it, you wanted to appear smart and make some murky "deep" observation about "incompatibility".

Now that your shit is taken apart, you've got nothing...

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...I got sucked into this by you, I did not want to say anything beyond that Mr.Hamelin sort of deliberately failed at his job as composer in this case...me saying "go and read this" is not particularly pretentious if you ask the questions, and I think the books will answer them...I did not write the books, I only read them...this is like telling somebody "go check HER out"...not really pretentious...more like common sense experience...I do it all the time...they do it to me too..

fredericfranc 5 months ago

"sort of deliberately failed at his job as composer in this case."

Well, how so?

Was it his sole "job as a composer" to make you laugh? Or did he only fail at his job to... make you laugh? Was that his intention at all? Did he still fail at this intention if a lot of other people find this funny?

What if his humorous intentions were limited to chuckling at some of the witty ideas and sudden transitions with a poker face, a reaction this piece certainly induces in me? Still fail?

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...I want to simplify, go for the bottom line...creationism, etc. debates are easier because they are sort of cut and dry logic, science, etc.,...here we have: "humor is incompatible with music", "music can only express itself"...these are somewhat abstruse esthetic, philosophical propositions...I am trying to send you to the people who live and experience it directly, but they are unusual people, thus reading THEM is a good idea, I will not be as good as them at this, perhaps lousy..

fredericfranc 5 months ago

Well, and my point is that someone else who has a better understanding of their work, wouldn't be "lousy" at explaining them, or making any sort of point.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...all these cultural esoterica you quote does not really help with much with the esthetic-philosophical perspective of these composers...you want to learn to operate on a different wavelength...as you will see if you actually read any of that...it is "another world" from postmodernism...might ruin your mind...in a way...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

"cultural esoterica you quote"

First of all, I haven't "quoted" anything or anyone, I've made arguments based on my understanding and thinking, secondly, I haven't said ANYTHING even REMOTELY resembling "esotherics", and if you think that treating the brain as a decoder and encoder of information is "esoterical", you simply have no clue about ANYTHING.

At any rate, you have no clue about anything, you can't argue, you have no point. Bye.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...you don't understand that in a context like this using a frame of reference: "how does an artistic project affect a large number of people, in terms of them being hard-wired, and what can we conclude from that", which is what you are doing; that this does not make any sense, in this context it is "esoteric" becase it is methodically inappropriate, is a total non-starter, a DOA intellectually...uprorariously preposterous, really..arguments should fit contexts..

fredericfranc 5 months ago

What contexts? I'm not following the contexts you're trying to impose here.

What I'm saying, music is an expression form. Humor is an expression form. They go together all the time. Saying they're "incompatible" is absurd. Saying it's because of "subjectivity" is absurd, because it has nothing to do with the point, and both are subjective anyway.

You came on here, saying how this piece wasn't funny because of some incompatibility you've never bothered to specify...

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...you better follow those "contexts" or else, because otherwise you will get nothing out of Mr. Schopenhauer ideas, plus of the others here...rather than making this arrogant asshole of yourself, develop some intelllctual humility, after all there is much for you to be humble and modest about, and become a humble student, not MY student, but THEIRS, and that might do you some good...otherwise you get nothing out of this episode...I am only helping THEM, but also you, too

fredericfranc 5 months ago

.... while the truth is that you simply didn't find it funny while someone else could.

I don't care about your bullshit "contexts" - you provide as few of them, as of actual clear points, which means NONE.

You're constantly beating around the bush, you have no clue what your points are, you are incapable of following a discussion or formulating your thoughts. You're completely uninteresting, and have nothing to say whatsoever.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...maybe I am completely uniteresting, but how Schop. and Strav., with their ideas as to the humor vs. music, and also that "music can only...", that these ideas ARE interesting, and I might as well emphasize their value and appeal and even power, but in the end these gentlemen can communicate them very well, so I only sort of promote the appeal of all this, but don't want to get too pretentious, it gets on your nerves so, right?

fredericfranc 5 months ago

Well, I'm not talking to Schopenhauer, I'm talking to someone who can neither make a point, nor has any decent understanding of whatever Schopenhauer has to say.

As I said, I can read Schopenhauer independently of you.

When I'm replying to YOUR posts, I'm replying to YOUR posts, and all my posts perfectly fit into the context of what YOU tried to express.

And I see no reason to consider Schopenhauer when talking to someone who obviously has no clue what he or Stravinsky said.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...because I have the instincts of a teacher, because I am one, I am less interested in myself, and my ideas, but just interested in GOOD ideas... if in this process of my making a point that Mr. Hamelin failed, etc., a MORE interesting idea flops out, I will lose interest in this "why Mr. Hamelin failed" thing, and promote the good stuff, because I think it is charming, so I put myself at the service of the charmiing stuff, besides it helps with the Mr. Hamelin thing, too...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

The thing is, you have no comprehension of that "charming stuff", and probably have no clue what it says.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...that may very well be true, but I have been living with this stuff for some time, and talked a lot to other people about it over time, and it even lent me the illusion, at least, of appreciating a lot of music bettter, and made me interested in music I would have otherwise ignored, and so on, so one must say the stuff has WORKED, maybe all for the wrong reasons, but if the shit works, hey, don't knock it...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

Anyway, you seem to be unable to make any sort of point aside from referring to books, so you may stop posting now, thanks.

twooffour 5 months ago

... up your sleeve.

The point of my "shared intuition" sentence was that people are able to use work and intuition to create material (be it musical, physical or verbal) that will be received as funny, emotional, beautiful or exciting by vast audiences.

It works, because that's what reality demonstrates.

A musician can sit at the piano and make an entire audience laugh, because his own instincts on what is funny is shared by his audience.

Saying that music is "incompatible"...

twooffour 5 months ago

... with humor is as absurd as saying that excitement is incompatible with action movies, and it's completely different from saying that humor in music is subjective to a degree as not everyone will perceive it as intended - which EQUALLY GOES FOR ANY OTHER EMOTIONS PUT IN MUSIC AS WELL AS ANY HUMOR OUTSIDE OF MUSIC.

And as long as you're unable to address ANY of these points, please, please, don't bother to reply.

I can look up Schopenhauer without your help, and if all you...

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...all this stuff you say about "common sense" experience of art are nice truisms...but unless you get into the experience of the listener-philosopher, and the composers, you will not see what is going on...I am trying to send you to the real "horse" so you get it from his mouth...either you want progress, or you want to run in circles...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

Where did I say anything about "common sense"? Common sense is a "sense" that is shared by a large group of people, and a large audience and a performer sharing a common sense of the performed artform, is a scenario that is possible, happens all the time, and could be said to be the whole essence of entertainment.

A brain "encodes" perceived expressions into a sequence of sounds. The sounds reach other brains, who "decode" this material in their own way.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...yeah, at this point refer to books is exactly what I am trying to do...If Strav. is better at explaining why "humor is incompatible...", or "all music can express is..." why not let him do it, he is good he is a pro, he is better at this than me...no shame for me to say it...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

He's not just better than you - YOU LACK ANY TRACE OF AN ABILITY TO MAKE ANY POINT OR CASE WHATSOEVER.

Between you and Stravinsky, there is sure a bunch of people that can formulate their thoughts or absorb what they've read, and are actually worth talking to.

So yea, you recommend to read Stravinsky, Schopenhauer, Shostakovich and Prokofiev. Thanks, I've caught that. Since you have nothing else to say, I'd suggest to wrap this up.

twooffour 5 months ago

The "decoders" of different people, or large groups of those people, can and do always share similar patterns - which is the reason why almost no instance of public entertainment looks like Monty Python's silly olympics.

It's also possible for people to modify or adjust their "decoders" based on focusing or diverting their attention, confirmation bias, and/or influence and input by other people.

So what people have is a vast selection of possibilities to...

twooffour 5 months ago

.... perceive and evalute things in similar as well as completely different ways.

And "humor in music" just fits into the larger picture.

Someone could write a piece intended to be funny, that is only agreed to be funny by a fringe minority.

Someone could write a completely serious compoition that will end up making the audience laugh, in amusement or embarassment.

Someone could write music they perceive as pleasant, that makes the audience cringe in horror.

twooffour 5 months ago

Jar Jar Binks and Drop Dead Fred were intended to be funny, but ended up amusing a tiny minority (or certainly pissing off a whole bunch of people who found them much more annoying than funny).

This stuff happens all the time, everywhere, be it humor, drama or romance, in music, literature, cinema or stand-up.

And you haven't contributed to or debunked ANY of that.

twooffour 5 months ago

... can do is telling me to read them, your contributions are worthless, and only go on to show that you don't have sufficient comprehension of the material you're referring to.

Like if I was involved in some kind of evolution vs. creationism debate, I could point to the "foundational falsehoods" series, but I wouldn't able to make any points contained there on my own, because I lack understanding in them.

Which, technically, means that I also shouldn't be arguing...

twooffour 5 months ago

... of some given timbre, or harmony. People are individual and different in many ways, but they are also very similar in many ways, and have the potential to both share almost identical thought patterns as well as fundamentally different - which goes for almost any area of life be it taste in movies, morality, or critical thinking; no matter what excuse you hear someone make to justify their irrational beliefs, you're bound to find someone else who says exactly the same).

twooffour 5 months ago

Aside from that, your initial point seemed to be that the toccata wasn't funny despite attempting to be humorous... because humor and music weren't compatible.

So it's a bit ironc of you to claim the opposite now, now isn't it?

Seems like you simply have no clue what your own point is.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...we already covered this, that there is no contradiction in this, after all Prokofiev's Sarcasms are not funny either, yet he did compose them, and why?...but we are now spinning our wheels here, this is now empty word-play at this point...if you are intersted in the subject, and it is a damn good one, just read some of the sources...you will make some progress that way...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

Yea, eventually I will, but in the meantime, I'd advise you to learn how to make a point, and how to represent the ideas of your sources in a brief way.

I make the point that humor in music is as objective/subjective as humor in any other area, or any other form of expression in music.

You have nothing to say to that.

The Room wasn't intended to be funny, yet virtually every viewer finds it hilarious. Go ponder that, and come back when you've learned to write sentences.

twooffour 5 months ago

@fredericfranc ...you are going on me into "naked assertions" here like crazy, about stuff you know nothing about...the "humor in music" thing is fragile as hell, nothing objective anywhere about it...definitely try to get into the "experience of the composer" framework...you will learn new things from these guys...develop a new perspective which you sure as hell need...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

So which of my assertions do you want me to back up?

Also explain how humor in music is any more fragile than any other expression you can put in it.

twooffour 5 months ago

"with art music at its most ambitious level."

So that's already two fallacies there: first, that "ambitious art music" has to be absolute in order to qualify, which it obviously doesn't.

Secondly, the notion that music can communicate nothing but itself, is silly. Music comes from our minds, and is received by our minds, and our minds cannot help but create associations to sounds, speech and emotions, and/or perceive certain sounds or intervals as "mellow", "harsh" or...

twooffour 5 months ago

... "consonant".

Even the most ambitious attempt to create music on "objective" principles will ultimately be either built around the way our brains perceive sound, or "miss their target", possibly creating something else in the process (oh the irony).

However, certain perceptions are shared among the vast majority of humanity, including the interpretation of obvious face expressions, tone or body language.

Music that is obviously furious, or obviously humorous, will...

twooffour 5 months ago

... most likely be perceived this way by the majority of listeners, although people may disagree whether they find a face threatening or involuntarily ludicrous.

There also isn't any logic to discounting this emotional factor from "ambitious art music" - at the very least, you'd have to leave out the majority of Romantics, heck the entire common practice period, as well as lots of Modernists from being "high art" if you're gonna go by that.

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour ...note that I am liftinng this whole idea of "incompatibility" etc. from those two guys, Schop. and Strav., even if I obviously like it, you want to follow this up, you know what to do...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

Unless you think that Bach's "Unser Herrscher" was supposed to sound like party music and in no way communicate religious awe, Ligeti was full of shit when trying to capture horror or "eternity" in his compositions, and Mozart's gallant style compositions were the imposing horror music of his day.

Music ALWAYS conveys something other than "itself", even if it doesn't want to.

And there is no "context" needed to create emotional reactions with sound.

twooffour 5 months ago

You should try Debussy too. He has a lot of humor in his music. Don't forget Haydn either.

MrStrav81 5 months ago

@MrStrav81 ...the concept is subtler and trickier than you think...I am aware of all these examples but they are "not supposed to work" and probably don't. Music works by mimesis; it cannnot "communicate" any human emotion whatsoever; we only project those emotions into music by a mechanism that is not understood. Emotions not context dependent work best, but humor, which is context dependent and highly idiosyncratic is very hard to do, mostly classical music shies away from it.

fredericfranc 5 months ago

@MrStrav81 ...I have an interesting example that sort of makes the point...the composer Frederic Chopin had a tremendous comic talent which he put to use to amuse his friends...some felt seriously that he was wasting himself as a composer; would have "achieved" vastly more as a comedic actor- so Chopin knew more than a little about humor, its power and its possibilities...yet he essentally never utilizes any of this in his compositions...why do you think this is so?...

fredericfranc 5 months ago

Don't even try reasoning with this guy. :)

We "project" our own emotions on funny music as much as we project it on "context-related" funny faces... which is to say, most of us project something very similar on similar things :D

twooffour 5 months ago

@twooffour

I won't. Not worth the effort. As a response (not to your comment), I have several examples. Haydn writing a fart in the slow movement of one of his symphonies, Debussy quoting Tristan and Isolde in the middle of Golliwog's Cakewalk, several from Hamelin - Etude No. 1 "Triple Etude d'apres Chopin" (hilarious concept and execution of that idea), "Suggestion Diabellique." I think composers are quite capable of injecting humor, it's rare that they want to communicate it though.

MrStrav81 5 months ago

Yea, definitely agree with the Triple Etude one, and thanks for the other examples, I'll check them out!

From what I managed to understand from frederic's murky ramblings, he maintains that humor in music is somehow much more subjective than other emotions - i.e. the composer may think something's funny, but everyone else will perceive it this way.

Sure, people will disagree on such matters, but there's definitely some "common ground" as well - just like everywhere else, basically.

twooffour 5 months ago

A good example of that would be the "break" variation in Hamelin's Campanella, and the infinitely prolonged one-note transition shortly before that.

I thought those parts where humorous when I first heard it, some people I showed it laughed at those parts (or remarked how it was humorous), and when I saw him play it live, several people around me actually had difficulties not to burst out in laughter.

Granted, I seem to have missed a lot of the "jokes" as one guy infront of me...

twooffour 5 months ago

... kept chuckling all the time at parts I didn't "get" (at least at that point), but that's the name of the game isn't it ;)

As an example of something non-humorous that can be perceived in different ways - there are some passages in Alkan's 3rd concerto movement that I had interpreted as "joyful laughter" or lighthearted excitement, while a commenter thought they expressed a "descent into madness", probably in a "mad laughter" sense.

twooffour 5 months ago

I can now see both sides.

(Btw, lots of humor in that piece, as well as many other works by Alkan :D)

So humor is about as objective/subjective in music as any other emotion, as far as I can see.

twooffour 5 months ago

In what piece did Haydn write a fart? lol.

SevenCircles 2 months ago 3

@SevenCircles Symphony no. 60, last movement-a solo bassoon moment that ends a phrase.

Musicaespressivo 2 months ago

@Musicaespressivo

I watched the video along with scrolling the score from ISMLP, but could not spot "le lâchement d’une vesse". Could you please do all us a favour and send the link to the piquant music video?

f1f1s 1 month ago

Wanna hear something funny?

Compare 2:37-42 to this:

ww (.)tudou (.)com(/) programs (/)view(/) Rt2aI9VXQnU 4:55-5:12

Hamelin listened to some metal :D

twooffour 6 months ago

Is this meant for one hand?

Vesivian 6 months ago

@Vesivian

No.

twooffour 6 months ago

@Vesivian the stems going up are RH. down are LH

Musicman180 6 months ago

i like the tomekkobialka composition better

jyoo21 6 months ago

@jyoo21 !!! :D I've been waiting 3 years for this type of comment!!! Thank you, jyoo21!!! (although I still think that Hamelin's toccata is better than mine :( )

tomekkobialka 6 months ago

@jyoo21 me too

VSV51 6 months ago

This piece of music is INCREDIBLE!!!!! One of the coolest melodies for an etude...especially the melody starting at measure 90! (1:10)

phantomfn8 6 months ago

Such a bad music. It's hard to finish all the 4 minutes 38 seconds. Stupid ending in E major, oh God.. Thanks for uploading though.

VSV51 7 months ago

@VSV51 At least like this video for the "for the foolish" ossia at 1:24.

tomekkobialka 7 months ago

@tomekkobialka ok, I will. thanks

VSV51 7 months ago

@VSV51

Calling something clearly meant as humorous and silly "stupid" is pretty discrediting ;)

twooffour 6 months ago

@twooffour You are right. I apologize.I shouldn't have said "stupid". i take my words back. It is humorous and silly..

VSV51 6 months ago

this etude is one hell of a technical monster.

FlyingBlackAndWhite 7 months ago

and a definite Kapustin quote at bar 127 - 1:40

bubuliboooo 7 months ago

1:45 I came.

musicguy119 8 months ago

There's a lot of repetition in this piece that seems more compositionally convenient than aesthetically meaningful.

John11inch 9 months ago

@John11inch Is aesthetic meaning objectively quantifiable? How is this comment different from saying "I don't prefer the repetitions"?

Sveccha93 8 months ago

Your first "question" is meaningless and serves as nothing other than a derivative epigone of some brand of pseudoskepticism - 'which brand' obfuscated by its failure as a rhetorical proposition due in part to both its lack of constraint and insufficient vocabulary. As such, it is pointless to address it, or address whatever correlation you may think and/or have thought that it had with the proceeding (")question(").

John11inch 8 months ago

@John11inch You are, of course, being unnecessarily vicious; that aside, someone of your intelligence (or at least education) ought to infer that I was criticizing the utility of your comment and not merely trying to engage in hand-waving sophistry with ill-formed logical propositions. I genuinely wish you would share the moments in the piece that seemed inauthentic or lazy to you. I've seen your channel and would be quite glad to have your insights.

Sveccha93 8 months ago

Regarding your second statement, the similarity is only at the most basely superficial level; it is difficult to understand how someone could fail to note the difference, given the inequality of terms present between the two. To explain how the comments are different would be to explain why red is not blue; if your grasp of the subject is deficient to such a degree, then why would I be so egotistic as to think that I could teach you?

John11inch 8 months ago

@John11inch Overlooking your pedantic bombast and misapplication of "epigone", as well as the string of ad hominems and begging the question that followed, why on earth would you essentially initiate a dialogue with the hoi polloi of the youtube community (even if you intended only to engage the OP) if you are, in fact, too humble to try to explain something to me, who still has, I feel, a valid question? Why criticize the composer in this forum if you're unwilling to add detail to your thought?

Sveccha93 8 months ago

There is no misapplication of the word "epigone" in my post. Any inferred misapplication is due solely to your misunderstanding of the term and/or the syntax within which it was used. Your post is hypocritical in a multitude of ways, vis-a-vis an accusation of ad hominem (which kind?) attacks nestled neatly between an entirely incorrect jab regarding grammar and a note about my intelligence, or lack thereof, as well as the misuse of terms (such as "begging the question") [cont]

John11inch 8 months ago

and . . . well, considering that you misused "begging the question," as such never occurred in my post, I don't know what you thought that you meant by it, but I feel fairly safe in assuming that you were looking for the term "loaded question," something you have used. There would be no "trying" to explain; there would be me explaining, and you "trying" to understand. Because you're an obnoxious cunt, I'm not going to bother. Obnoxious cunts dissuade me from speaking civilly.

John11inch 8 months ago

On the subject of begging the question, you assume that I wish to engage in a dialogue with the "hoi polloi" (i.e. you); you are incorrect. I am not interested in engaging in a serious conversation in a place with a 500 character limit, not to mention another person(s) who cannot adequately contribute; you confuse "serious conversation" with "comparatively serious [as in, compared to other conversations on youtube] conversation."

John11inch 8 months ago

Your question is not valid. Your question serves no purpose other than to attempt to goad some statement out of me that you think you could dissect, in order to defend what is obviously an opposing belief. Your comment was rude, snotty and completely ill-conceived, both formally and tactically. I am not interested in adhering to an arbitrary double-standard that you wish to impose; your statement is worthless. Until you fix this, do not comment on the "utility" of mine.

John11inch 8 months ago

Comment removed

Sveccha93 8 months ago

@John11inch I removed my last two comments, though you likely can still read them in your email. I've gone amiss in two ways: 1) not being rigorous at the outset and 2) responding to your aggression as a game rather than addressing the original deficit. It is understandable that you felt I was a Hamelin fan trying to pull a Socrates on you; however, this isn't the case. I was merely hoping to elicit some detail. A misplaced hope.. I do like Hamelin's Ornstein, etc..but his work is new to me.

Sveccha93 8 months ago

I cannot read them, as, for some time, now, youtube will only alert me of the most recent comment made on one of my submissions and/or directed toward me per video, as opposed to per comment, or even per poster. It's very annoying, because I don't have any interest in responding to the majority of the comments that I receive, but there may have been another comment in the same video that I would have liked to have responded to. It's a poor system.

John11inch 8 months ago

Regarding your original question, it's not that the system is technically incomputable, but in a more pragmatic and realistic sense, my statement is not something that I would be able to defend without a word count that would far exceed the assumed attention span and/or level of interest of the youtube commenting audience. If you don't mind being pigeonholed, perhaps you could amplify what you meant by the term "repetitions," and we could go from there.

John11inch 8 months ago