Boulez: "Sur Incises" 1/3

[Hermoooo]

Amazing!

[mindbodylightsound10]

i'm personally of the opinion composer's should not reveal their secrets. it's very easy to come out sounding like a mad scientist. such as with this case. great piece, but really stop jerking me around by starting and stopping and commenting all the time.

[physphilmusic]

Since Boulez is such an internationally respected figure, I think that the burden of proof actually lies ON you. Give me your arguments, and let's see whether your opinion is of any more worth than the average street kid who says that Beethoven is for sissies.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic No, Boulez is a clever fraud who has been propped up by state and institutional patronage in the face of widespread indifference and hostility from most of the public who have an interest in classical music.

I'm not some free-market philistine who thinks that there should be no support of high art through public funding, but there is no doubt that if Boulez's career had depended exclusively upon popular support he would have had to seek some kind of alternative employment.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 The problem is, Mr. Fredigunidis22, you might say the burden of proof is on me. And at least twice I have outlined what I perceive is the "musical content" of the piece. I've already done my job. You, on the other hand, haven't even responded to my arguments. You've just said that "I am firmly convinced that there is nothing worthy of getting." What does that mean, I wonder?

The meaning is clear - you have lost the argument. LOST. Now I'm using capitals, not to bully you -

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic If you say so, my hot-headed young friend, if you say so.

You're becoming hard work, and not in an intellectually stimulating or interesting way. You might, if you want to broaden your education, look up the fact/value distinction in a good dictionary of philosophy while pondering the difference between discursive argument and mere assertion. I doubt that you'll bother, though; you seem far too pleased with yourself as you are.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 To close off, I suspect (just suspect) that you've been carried away by postmodernist trends, seemingly hinting that everything one says about a musical piece has no objective value whatsoever. Hence what everyone does is just state their opinion. If you truly believe this, there is no more purpose in continuing the discussion. I'm interested in the inherent musical value of Boulez. I'm not interested in deconstructing the sociopoltitical factors behind his rise.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic Actually, this IS an interesting remark (NB. capitals being used here for emphasis rather than attempted intimidation!). I am not a postmodernist relativist, and nothing I have written can or should be construed as denying the objectivity or transcendence of certain values (including those expressed in, or indeed constituting, opinions). I'm interested in stating my opinion that Boulez's music (as music) has no inherent value. The other stuff you just made up.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 Yep. Got that. Actually I got that like 10 comments ago. Now, may I ask for the umpteenth time, why do you think so? As for why I think that Boulez HAS value (again, capitals being used for emphasis!), I've already elaborated that in my first few reply posts to you. So the burden of proof lies on you, to refute that, or better yet, come up with arguments against this piece, Boulez's music as a whole, or even serialism/modern music in general.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 By the way, if you don't want to give justifications why, then I don't see the point of any discussion. An opinion is an opinion, but it has more worth if their are good arguments to back it up. That's what I've been trying to get to you. You may not be a blatant postmodern relativist, but you may have been unwittingly carried away by postmodernist trends in how to discuss: instead of focusing on the issue, you focus on the peripheral socio-political factors behind it.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic You might be able to post half a dozen comments on any single occasion, but I can only reply to one at a time. Unless the whole point is to bludgeon me into silence by confusing me.

How have I focused on "the peripheral socio-political factors behind [the issue]" (which I take to mean the artistic validity or otherwise of Boulez's music)? I have concentrated on affirming a personal value-judgement, only incidentally referring to factors which may or may not be "peripheral".

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 Most of my "half-a-dozen comments" are basically trying to get you to respond to my earlier point:

"And it's very hard to substantiate any musical opinion. But take a look at the "virtuoso" excerpt at 1:33 onwards. There are fragments of repeated notes as well as snippets of chromatic scales - in the midst of rapid broken-chord like arpeggios which fly all over the keyboard with a fluidity I can only compare to Mozart. It's disjoint, but it makes perfect sense."

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic This piece bears about as much resemblance to Mozart as an explosion in a firework factory bears to an expert pyrotechnic display, or a randomly-stirred vat of alphabet soup to the works of Shakespeare.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 My accusation that you have focused on peripheral factors is because you simply have never given me a reply in terms of musical content! You have merely replied by saying that Boulez is famous because of artistic politics! Yes, you may have "affirmed" your "personal value judgment", but as I said, I got that 20 posts ago. I know you believe that Boulez is crap. Now, rather than just affirming, please JUSTIFY. Your reluctance to do so makes me think you are a relativist.

[physphilmusic]

@physphilmusic And forgive me for my third post, but I do need to note that I thought we're discussing music, not philosophy. Music criticism doesn't question things such as whether a judgment is valid personally or universally. It operates on the assumption that what a critic says is claimed to be universally valid. That is why we can have fierce discussions on say, Vivaldi's merit as opposed to merely saying, "OK, I like Vivaldi and you don't. End of story."

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic It could be said, couldn't it, that we're discussing music in philosophical terms? You're making a rather sweeping pronouncement about the scope and limits of music criticism; surely there have always been controversies and disagreements, as well as broad consensuses of opinion, both about music itself and the role of music criticism? As it happens, non-relativist that I am, I support your universalism even if I put it to a different use in saying that Boulez's music is plain bad.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 Every discussion of music (or anything) is of course based on certain philosophical assumptions. My idea of what music criticism seems to constitute is based on reading various program notes and reviews on the performances and recordings of new as well as old pieces in the classical repertoire. Very few things are without controversy, but the ways critics write reviews are strikingly similar. There seems to be a broad consensus on what a music review should be like.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic Or a quasi-official "party line" that aspirant music critics must adopt.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 It's debatable whether musical value is strictly not empirically demonstrable. Yes, it's definitely not demonstrable using the scientific method. However, a piece of music still has content which is factually demonstrable, and it is possible to argue objectively using such facts. I've observed that there will always be some subjectivity - but you can't, for example, deny outright that Beethoven is rubbish. His sense of structure and melodic development is empirically verifiable.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic We're not talking about Beethoven whose musical language, after 200 years (more or less), is largely beyond controversy.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 When I heard Boulez's Incises for the first time, I heard it without his explanation first. And the piece did seem to make sense - there are recurring themes and fragments, recurring rhythmic devices, consistent fluidity, exploration of combinations of instrumental timbres, etc. Such techniques have been used by composers for hundreds of years - which is why I quoted Mozart. In effect, I recognize the building. Perhaps it's because I made an effort to replay and listen again to it

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic The implication here is that you're open-minded and work hard at listening, while I am blinkered and lazy. To vary the analogy, I'm only prepared to bang my head against a brick wall for so long.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 And lastly, your fireworks and alphabet soup analogies seem to be chosen way too hastily. It's clear that Boulez's works are not the epitome of complete randomness and chaos. A better analogy would be Shakespeare and Beckett - hundreds of years apart, yet Elizabethan and absurd theater have some common similarities that make both playwrights affirmed as major literary figures (of course, I'm not trying to imply that Beckett is as great as Shakespeare).

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic If I'm wrong, I'm wrong, whether I deliberated for hours (or days, or weeks), or came to my conclusions in a split second. Haste is therefore surely beside the point. To the listener unapprised of its complex organisation, Boulez's music is PERCEPTIVELY chaotic, and this is surely a fact that brings its musical validity (and aesthetic viability) into question. Incidentally, have you read Lerdahl and Jackendoff's "A Generative Theory Of Tonal Music"?

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 "Perceptively chaotic"? Of course, since most of us are conditioned to respond to tonal music since we were babies! But that only applies to tonality. Structure-wise, motif-development-wise, timbre-wise, rhythmic-wise, Boulez is not that chaotic, even more after he explains his composition like he does here. My view of music is more open - you can have controlled chaos as art. The way I perceive dodecaphonic and serialist music in general is that it's an attempt to be coherent

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic The important fact is that we CAN be conditioned or acculturated to tonal music; it remains to be demonstrated that we can be similarly conditioned into an intuitive understanding of Boulez or the postwar avant-garde generally. The fact that Boulez feels obliged to explain his compositions after the fact rather argues against any such intuitive grasp of it. Chomsky believes we have a hard-wired mental faculty for understanding natural language, and perhaps also for tonal music.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 I believe that we CAN be much better conditioned to atonal music if we are conditioned to listen to it much more - to the point that we can somewhat separate "banal" atonal pieces from the more interesting ones. However, I concede that it is difficult to get accustomed to it to the level of integrity as tonal music. The 300+ years development of tonality truly made it expand to a colossus of coherence which has never been equaled by the development of any other harmonic technique

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic Shakespeare and Beckett both wrote dramatic works (divided by themselves or editors into scenes, acts, etc). Beckett's language is often obscure (but seldom altogether meaningless), and his plots usually deliberately inconsequential. However, to make the analogy exact with say, integral serialism, you'd have to re-tool the English (or French) language to ensure that certain parts of speech and syntactic patterns were not privileged over others, etc.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 I think the analogy works - Boulez's language is often obscure, but it's rarely meaningless! Don't you think his explanations in the video prove that it's not meaningless? You can't compare it to changing the grammar of language altogether, since grammar changes very slowly over time. Tonality, on the other hand, has evolved visibly every few decades.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic His explanations in the video confirm Morton Feldman's critical remark that Boulez "is not interested in how a piece sounds, only how it is made".

Certainly tonal materials expanded in the common-practice period between roughly 1600-1900, but they form a coherent, internally consistent syntax of pitch organisation. It will be interesting to see whether atonal music can admit of so many styles, and have such potential for growth, change and development.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 understand. Still, I find some coherent elements in it.

My perception of Feldman's comment is that it's more accurate stated as "Boulez is not interested in explaining how a piece sounds, only how it is made." Boulez does not make remarks as to whether his motifs and compositional techniques are "beautiful" or "poignant" or what. But does that even imply that he didn't care at all about those qualities? Now even if the answer is yes, DOES a piece of music have to be beautiful in

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 the way Strauss' tone poems are, for example? Does it have to invoke a concrete emotion/feeling? I dare say that that's not a must, although you might affirm it. There is definitely a place for Boulez's music, especially if it can invoke impressions of being exciting, interesting, spontaneous, energetic, refined, even fresh.

"I would be more accommodating to the atonalists if they didn't..." - do you hate atonality or atonalists? This opens up a flaw in your argument.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 Do you hate atonality or atonalists? If you could "accommodate" them better, doesn't that imply that the well is already poisoned before the music even starts to play? The fact is that in the 1990s Boulez changed his earlier "serialist-only" radicalism. In this postmodern world recognized composers come from all different parts of the spectrum - Carter, Corigliano, Adams, Gubaidulina, MacMillan...but dodecaphonic/serialist music remains as an option, and it should be.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 The fact remains that tonality, in its Mahlerian stage of development, was something that some people could reasonably say they needed a break from. If you want to compose new music, sooner or later you will be tempted to challenge whether the traditional conventions of tonality are still needed for a piece to make sense - such as establishing a clear key and ending with a perfect cadence. Eventually you will come to the point where you want to express yourself in atonal terms

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 - is that wrong? For example, atonality in Wozzeck made it distinct and special, compare to anything in 19th century opera.

There are many systems of compositions which are non-tonal, and it's difficult to demonstrate that we can get accustomed to them like we are to standard tonality. However, does that mean that we should stick to mainstream pop, rock and film music in our new music listening repertoire? Do we have to eternally insist on "memorable melodies"?

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 Bruckner and Boulez may not lay on the same tonality spectrum, which has been in place for 4 centuries. However, I strongly believe that there is a broader spectrum to which they all belong to. Something I discovered when experimenting with atonal techniques myself is that the compositional principles of coherence, contrast, foreground/background, development of motifs, etc. are not very different from tonal music. The only radical thing is the harmony.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic To take your second main point first: Since, in passing judgement on something presumably intended and manifestly offered as a work of art, we are firmly in the realm of values (which may be affirmed and even argued for by an appeal to other values) rather than facts (which may be empirically demonstrated) I am not sure which TYPE of justification you are asking me to supply. I am not a relativist.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic I think that there is musical content in this piece in the sense that there are pitches, relative durations and simultaneities, timbres and intensities. The problem for me is that these contents do not cohere. You could arrange bricks, mortar, beams, tiles panes of glass, etc., according to some highly complex pattern known to the architect (and discoverable by someone reading the plans), and still not have what most person would recognise as a viable building.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 Your opinion that a pattern only known to the architect is insufficient for aesthetic value is debatable. Schoenberg never intended the 12-tone method to be ostensible to listeners - it was from the beginning meant to be only a composer's tool. Still, I'm ready to take it further and say that a piece of music is still good even if you need the composer to explain it. That's what Boulez does here - just demonstrating how the themes are developed.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic "Schoenberg never intended the 12-tone method to be ostensible to listeners - it was from the beginning meant to be only a composers tool". True - I've read Perle, Leibowitz, Rufer and Schoenberg himself. And this, I think, was precisely Schoenberg's great mistake: as far as pitch organisation was concerned, he shaped his compositions according to a private code, not to audible patterns. This was precisely why he retained baroque and classical forms (new wine in old bottles).

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 in the absence of tonality. Sometimes it results in unconvincing randomness, but often it's quite persuasive - like this, and to name another favorite of mine, Schoenberg's piano concerto. Of course it is harder to comprehend than tonal music - it can be mistaken as total chaos. But the same argument might apply to the fact that it's much easier to comprehend Taylor Swift than Anton Bruckner, for example. Boulez's music is just further down the spectrum.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic I don't think that Boulez lies along the same harmonic continuum as Taylor Swift (or pop music generally) and Bruckner; there's a radical discontinuity between the syntax of his music and the common practice that unites theirs. I would be more accommodating to the atonalists if they didn't systematically, high-handedly and self-righteously EXCLUDE so many musical possibilities (e.g. Boulez: "I must abandon the past").

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 Still, the crucial difference between us is that you demand atonal music to stand up to the achievements and possibilities of tonality, such as "coherent, internally consistent syntax of pitch organisation." Granted, that non-tonal music can never have such properties to the extent of tonal music, i.e. nothing of Boulez can possibly ever equal the best of Beethoven, does it mean that it is nonsense and trash? Hardly. I openly admit that even here, Boulez's music is difficult to

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 I think that the problem goes down to this - you think that this Boulez piece sounds random, while I don't. Honestly, I think it's quite ironic, since this video is of the composer himself dissecting the piece. Do you think what he says makes sense? I think it's obvious that it's more than a totally private code - he never mentions tone rows, or rhythm rows, or timbre rows, or whatever. He just explains it in terms of motivic development - I had a basic idea, I extended it, etc.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 I think this is indeed what Schoenberg wanted to achieve - that traditional concepts of musical coherence can still be applied to the piece, though in a more limited manner of course. Boulez doesn't ask us to marvel at how very well-thought out or organized his notes are. He doesn't show that they all mathematically fit together perfectly, that the notes don't repeat each other, or anything. It's clear that he composes by ear as much as he does by theory. Can't you accept that?

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic PS. The only "job" you've done is to express an opinion. That's all I've done, too.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 Of course, I'm also stating my opinion. I don't disagree with that, nor do I think that my opinion is beyond doubt. What I'm saying is that I'm stating my opinion with much more justification than you do. When you said there's nothing in this piece, I tried to point out that indeed there was something: I even gave you the timings of the video. But you replied with just saying that it's just all nonsense, without even bothering to show the alleged absurdity of my position.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 All you did is just say that it's all crap, and that Boulez's reputation is an international artistic-political conspiracy. Does this have even any iota of "discursive argument"? I doubt. While I admit that my opinions are not shared by everyone, and that my knowledge is also limited in many ways, I do try to not to resort to dismissing a statement without attempting to demolish the argument first. Neither do I turn to conspiracy theories which are hard to prove/disprove.

[physphilmusic]

@physphilmusic Now regarding my philosophy of art, I hardly think it's propitious yet to bring it in. I was aiming for music criticism here, not philosophy. Music criticism doesn't normally discuss about fact-value distinctions.

I affirm that you did raise some good questions about virtuosity, memorability, etc. which I am more than happy to elaborate upon. But I'm afraid to do so to someone who will just regard everything I say as nonsense, and declare that as "discursive argument" on his part.

[physphilmusic]

despite your remarks, if you bothered to actually read my posts, I use capitals only when I need to get a crucial point across, as in this - YOU HAVE NO ANSWER TO MY ARGUMENTS. Sure, you can say that Boulez is a fraud, that it's been all a conspiracy, etc etc....what force do your words have? No arguments. Can I say the same of Beethoven? Bach? Mozart? Tchaikovsky? You, Mr Fredigundis22? You are a fraud? When we strip off arguments and start saying things like "I'm firmly convinced..."

[physphilmusic]

that seems strongly indicative that our words are nothing, just unsupported assertions. And I don't care whether you want respect or not - the reality is that you are an idiot at best, or worse, an intellectually dishonest person, since you say a lot of stuff and don't bother to back it up properly. And this is not just my opinion - EVERYONE has a right to call you a nobody if you don't support your assertions. Even creationists try to give reasons for their opinions.

[physphilmusic]

Those idiots who keep criticizing Boulez should actually make an effort to WATCH this video - without his commentary, the piece still makes some sense, with his explanations you can clearly see that it's NOT random shit. He's playing around with instrumental timbres, space, and most of all repetition and reuse of the basic short-long rhythm inside all of that- devices which great composers have masterfully used for CENTURIES.

[Khayyam1048]

I'll admit that I know sod all about music, although I do like some of it.

My taste for classical music probably stops short at Mahler, although I'll admit to liking bits of Stravinsky, Bartok and Hindemith.

I've got to say, though, that this really is a bit of a racket (I mean soundwise, although the secondary meaning of a swindle might not be inapt.)

The piano playing is impressively virtuosic. It must be murder to sight-read OR learn music like this. It still sounds pretty horrible.

[turow6000]

Fascinating music, and pure french sensivity in it!

[Fredigundis22]

As a pleasurable experience this ranks somewhere below being buried nose high in excrement while having rusty nails slowly hammered into one's scrotum.

[Fredigundis22]

@vivienmerchant

By "born of personal experience" (note the spelling of "born" in this context, by the way, although "borne" is etymologically related) do you mean that I myself have not assimilated the music of the Second Viennese School?

It's probably true to some extent. I love Schoenberg's early tonal works, and I can perceive merit in some of his freely atonal and serial works, although I find them hard to love. Webern I have no use for at all. On the other hand, I do love Berg.

[Fredigundis22]

@vivienmerchant

Please don't show your ignorance even more, still less while trying to "correct" me. There is no such expression in English as "borne of". "Borne" is the past participle of the verb "to bear". There is an expression "to bear out" (i.e. to confirm, to show to be correct), of which "borne" helps to form the correct past tense, but it is quite unrelated to any sense that you intended here.

I've not given you any bogus analogies, so please don't lecture me with bogus grammar.

[Fredigundis22]

I'm sorry, but this is not music - it's just drivel. The Emperor really isn't wearing any clothes this time.

Boulez is a clever confidence trickster who has got away with murder - metaphorically speaking, of course - for years.

The postwar avant garde is a cult.

[robinmorace]

@Fredigundis22: I am so sorry that the particular collusion of genetic traits and societal context that has manifested the person you are now also rendered you incapable of hearing this music. I would, however, greatly appreciate it if you took the care to keep thoughtless and non-constructive musings to yourself. Some of us do not find this to be drivel; quite the opposite, in fact. I, for one, find his harmonic and rhythmic processes highly organic and engaging.

[Fredigundis22]

@robinmorace

What revolting prose you write! ("Particular collusion of genetic traits and societal context..." indeed! Why couldn't you just write something like "a combination of heredity and upbringing..."?)

You know what I think of this piece of worthless rubbish, so who are you trying to convince when you write about finding "his harmonic and rhythmic processes highly organic and engaging"? If you're going to write nonsense, at least have the decency to write it in plain English.

[robinmorace]

@Fredigundis22 My prose is sarcastic. Boulez's command of musical discourse is demonstrable. Yours, to my current knowledge, is not. If I am wrong about this, please correct me. You give no support for your claim that this piece is "just drivel." If you provide no substantiation, your claim is meaningless. If you have a legitimate reason for your dislike of this piece, I would love to hear it. Otherwise, keep any infantile criticism to yourself.

[Fredigundis22]

@robinmorace

Your prose may be intended sarcastically, but it's still poor.

Some queries:

1) What do you mean by Boulez's "command of musical discourse"? Is this the same thing as being able to compose good, memorable music?

2) Whatever you mean by the above, in what sense is it "demonstrable"?

3) What kind of "substantiation" do you require for my opinion that the piece (like others by Boulez) is drivel? I note that you provide no support whatsoever for your own opinions.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 This is very funny!!! Do you think good music always has to be memorable, in the Tchaikovsky sort of manner?

And it's very hard to substantiate any musical opinion. But take a look at the "virtuoso" excerpt at 1:33 onwards. There are fragments of repeated notes as well as snippets of chromatic scales - in the midst of rapid broken-chord like arpeggios which fly all over the keyboard with a fluidity I can only compare to Mozart. It's disjoint, but it makes perfect sense.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic Why bring Tchaikovsky into it, since I didn't mention him (unless you just want to appear to score a point without actually addressing what I wrote)? Certainly Schoenberg (even though he "est mort" according to some sources) believed that memorability (not necessarily of the Tchaikovsky kind) was a precondition for musical comprehensibility.

I don't care what's in this piece, or how "virtuosic" it is - I think it is ugly, pretentious and, at the perceptual level, incoherent.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 Well, even if Schoenberg said that, I believe that it's only sensible to make a distinction between the memorability of a Tchaikovsky, Puccini, Dvorak, or even Prokofiev kind of melody and the memorability which I get from listening to something like this as well as pieces like a Bach fugue or a Mahler symphony. I brought up the former case since I thought that you seem to demand that kind of memorability, which I don't even think Boulez has himself regarding the piece.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic By all means make distinctions between "the memorability of a Tchaikovsky, Puccini, Dvorak or... Prokofiev". Just don't involve me, since I didn't mention any of them, nor did I have them in mind.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 On the other hand, if you're talking about the more refined, flexible kind of "memorability", I think that it's obvious this piece has that. Try listening it more than once (and as a rule of thumb for serious music works I usually need several listens before I "get" it fully). It's definitely not random, it recycles familiar motifs (e.g. the short-long rhythm he mentions) in development. The memorability also comes from the texture, the instrumental combinations, etc.

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic You're assuming that I haven't already listened to it several times. I have. I don't "get it" because I am firmly convinced that there is nothing worthy of getting.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 And if you "don't care what's in this piece", may I ask you one simple question: WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING by thinking that it's "ugly, pretentious and incoherent"? If you really don't care, you cross the boundary from being a respected critic to simply a mouth of hate speech. I hate Boulez! I hate atonal stuff! Yeah right! I recall that somewhere before you've asked others to substantiate their opinions. That's laughable considering that you haven't said anything regarding

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic It always makes me chuckle inwardly to see people employing capitals in order to bully or hector. As for your remark about "hate speech", well, that actually did make me laugh out loud.

I've no desire to be "respected"; as a matter of fact, I can't think of anything more dreary and mediocre, other than being a fawning lickspittle for the institutional avant-garde.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 the content of the piece itself. So despite your fluent prose, you betray a empty head and a closed mind who can only parrot what Schoenberg says. I myself did NOT hinge the merits of the piece on its virtuosity, unlike some others here, but virtuosity is still a virtue in music, however insignificant, so I mentioned it. You, on the other hand, did not even bother to present any kind of discernible argument on why you think it's "incoherent". .

[Fredigundis22]

@physphilmusic Why must my invocation of Schoenberg bring upon me the charge of empty-headedness, a closed mind and a tendency to parrot other people's opinions (on the presumption that I am incapable of forming and expressing my own)? (Incidentally, is virtuosity - as an autonomous phenomenon - a musical virtue?)

The burden of proof, as I see (or, rather, hear) it, rests firmly with those who claim to discern musical coherence and aesthetic merit in this piece.

[physphilmusic]

@Fredigundis22 So in conclusion it is clear that you have egregiously failed on two points:

1. You didn't answer my attempts to describe what I think are musical content in this piece.

2. Having bypassed this, you start your conspiracy theories, also without assertion.

I think that defending my views on memorability, virtuosity, or Schoenberg is useless if I'm dealing with someone who just wants to scream out their own views without explaining. I think it's indicative of a minor mental illness.

[vivienmerchant]

@robinmorace Dear Robin, Thank you for your comments and for attempting, with some grace, to fend off several angry, directly combative and offensive remarks. There is nothing wrong with a disagreement and an exchange of views. This person is not worth the effort; I have had several messages from the same source of varying degrees of paper-thin tetchiness. Don't bother replying again.

[Kethvan]

Among my favourites. Boulez's comparatively mature language. Polished, logical, and exciting timbral changes.

[Fredigundis22]

@vivienmerchant

A completely bogus analogy. Presumably you have in mind the early, freely atonal music of the Second Viennese School. This still hasn't been assimilated by the general music-loving public, and never will be.

[sebastianblack96]

'Boulez has become such a bore!'

onclevanja, your're the bore!

[fdaltrey]

Was the competition the Umberto-whatever thing that Cascicoli won?

[Varese52]

Boulez has become such a bore!

Or, perhaps, you lack the requisite patience to allow him to show you something new about himself and his musicality. It must be remembered that he is one of those most in touch with music's past and present. What he learns from his frequent forays into this body of work cannot help but be of interest.

[onclevanja]

Boulez has become such a bore! He is like the revolutionary Napoleon who turned into a power hungry dictator (and started writing neo-classicist music on the way). Forget this shitty shit and listen again to his piano sonata nr 2 (and nr 1) and polyphonie X.

[noahmushroom]

Shitty shit, neoclassicist? What the hell are you talking about? There is nothing neoclassical about Boulez's late works. In fact, a late work like 'Sur Incises' sounds way more exciting, refined, sensuous, spontaneous and fresh than those early dry serial pieces you mention.

[minirausch]

awesome, thanks for posting!

[franzliszt370]

I love how Boulez makes composing look so easy...when nothing could be farther from the truth.

[Fredigundis22]

@franzliszt370

As Doctor Johnson once remarked, "I wish it were impossible!"

[GreggaryPeccary]

I wanted to post the same thing, but didn't know how to "rip" (Is that correct computer lingo?) it. Could you briefly describe how that works? What do you think of Eclat on the same dvd? I don't like it that much, it sounds a little lackluster, at least in that performance.

[galas06]

thank you!