Sir John Tavener on Mozart

[plasticPlaystation]

@jpbouz ??? Lots of removed comments.

[plasticPlaystation]

@jpbouz Lol, we have the opinion of the great Sir John Tavener against the words of Sir Nobody...

Just open your ears, and try to understand what he is trying to communicate. Do everyone have to think just like you???

[plasticPlaystation]

@jpbouz Man, I thought you were a troll, now i'm thinking you are an attention whore...

[jpbouz]

@plasticPlaystation yep, as i suspected, you don't have much to say. probably for the better all the same

[suelines100]

John Tavener has knowledge as a composer and musicologist but even he is left circling with words that hang on his belief system. Without the theology I have to use my everyday words: that I feel as close as is possible to me as human being to sublimity, excruciatingly pain and pleasure, movement out of my normal sphere of feeling into a place in my being I don't otherwise know of or experience.

[MarcheseCadmio88]

Personally, I don't believe in any god, absolutely. But I surely believe in Spirituality which is set in each individual. Mozart's and Tavener's music is such a universal mean of communication... I think it trascends religious/unreligious differences.

[femaleinessex]

Heart beat of a child? A single note of a child. 

[marcoamedrano]

I agree with Tavener's esteem of Mozart - much of Mozart's music does have a mystical beauty to it, especially adagios and slow movements for solo instruments. However, I disagree with his theory of the "imperfect" man who channeled God (and in a sort of pantheistic way, as Tavener suggests). Maybe he has seen "Amadeus" one too many times.

[KolyaKomarov]

I just can say that view of Sir John Tavener the only way how orthdox believer can feel Mozart. Mozart is a music of paradise.

[brucefetter]

I am afraid that what some call silly terms are what gives beauty its true root and form. I lol about calling God or Christ "that". Music in this form captures the universal in its particular form, namely, the inner vision of God in Christ.

[TheJoyfulPianist]

true art is the abandonment of the ego to the divine, whether known or not. Let's stop saying these silly terms God, Jesus, Divine, etc. Let's just call it That or Beauty. We can all agree about this.

[vanderbilt887]

Except that I am in no way religious (I would replace the word God with Nature), I completely agree with everything Tavener says about Mozart. If there was ever a moment in music history that might merit the term divine, that moment was Mozart. Also a *huge* Mozart lover here.

[vanderbilt887]

I was quite amazed when Tavener spoke about Mozart's music saying it was for him a manifestation of the essence of God.

I had always thought about Mozart's music as being the rasa (the essenctial mental and emotional state, the spiritual rapture) of Music itself.

[vanderbilt887]

I also agree with what Albert Einstein said:

"Mozart is the greatest composer of all. (..) The music of Mozart is of such purity and beauty that one feels he merely found it — that it has always existed as part of the inner beauty of the universe waiting to be revealed."

[jesaintlouis]

making the comment that God some how is communicating through a persons talent to the world does not insult the human component if I make a baby with someone I say it is beautiful it does not take away from the individual to state I made that.

[BarbaraPloyer333]

Deep, very deep, my friend.

[azoriusherald]

I have heard it proposed, and I believe it, that this sort of overflowing talk of divine manifestations in a human being is probably borne of jealousy. Can't Tavener give Mozart his props without saying that god had intervened somehow? It's kind of insulting to Mozart, isn't it?

[nin456]

No.

[Amistriotis]

you must be joking.. irrelevant perhaps but insulting? It sounds really narrowminded and sad.

btw i don't agree with sir Tavener..

[azoriusherald]

To be perfectly honest, listening to Tavener again months later, I feel like Mozart is being even more insulted than I originally perceived. It doesn't occur to Tavener for a moment that a human being could write music this beautiful without assistance from the divine. He even phrases it as God "communicating through this frail man." You must have a similarly low opinion of the abilities of men if you don't take offense at these assertions.

[CrystalPalace1990]

Yes, but Tavener is clearly of the belief that all things come from God. It would, therefore, be a perfectly valid point to make. Whether the initial belief is correct is a totally different matter....

[peddletoneG]

@azoriusherald Honesty is great, but not when it so often expresses itself in the 'cup half empty' approach--one I have too often succumbed to--and in this case is no 'insult' (intent) so much as attempting to express the highest respect and admiration that Taverner himself comes short of words to express, and does the best he can to laud a human unusually blessed with talent. Not my 'desert island' composer, but if we'd only had a few more decades of production out of the genius Mozart. If...

[azoriusherald]

@peddletoneG Oh I'm totally with you there. I don't see my view as "cup half empty." In fact, my position is more optimistic and proud of the achievements of my fellow human beings than Tavener's apparently is. I realize Tavener is trying to express his liking for Mozart in the best way he can, but I think that he should reconsider the implication of conferring credit onto an entity that is NOT Mozart at all. I just want Mozart to get his kudos instead of essentially being called a mere "vessel"

[eoghdes18]

I'm on Tavener's side.

And personally, I think that' performing or listening to Tevener's music is even more divine than Mozart's. His music is truly Godly.

[lixechan]

Guys.. I realise that the first guy to comment was annoying to say the least...

But you still shouldn't feed the Troll.

^_^

xx

[grpapelham]

How sad that someone listening to an analysis that steps aside from modernism and rationalism can only see "shit"&"bollocks". Doesn't it occur to you that if you only see like that and superficiality, it is a reflection on you, not Tavener?

[asv786]

hi .if any one can see sir john tavener to ask him to make cd of his beautiful names concert from westminster catedral,thans

[wigs666]

John Tavener doesn't half talk some bollocks sometimes.

[janeym]

he's a very interesting figure indeed. both of them are! and I love tavener's spirituality! I prefer him over rutter, who is supposedly an atheist and does occasionally write slightly cheesy music in my opinion. tavener has written a knew universal mass which should be amazing! I'm so excited to see his preconcert talk and the premier at st. thomas's church fifth avenue!

[vissen33]

I've played the Tibetan horn in Sir John Veil of the temple twice in Amsterdam and Berlin. And I must say that what he says with his music is at a very high spiritual level. That's what a hear and understand when he is speaking about Mozart in this beautiful video. Please do not judge to soon. Sir John is a great composer. Try to forget your own ideas and be open. There is so much to discover.

[plastypoppers]

i think Stravinsky KNOWS

[somor98]

John Tavener may have had some influence on the new simplicity, but he doesn't know shit on music theory. Just at lot of new age mumbo jumbo.

[janeym]

how do you know his theory background?

[NihilNominis]

He's Russian Orthodox...hardly New Age. (Some say he's no longer, but he himself contends that he remains Orthodox).

[grpapelham]

How sad that someone listening to an analysis that steps aside from modernism and rationalism can only see "shit"&"bollocks". Doesn't it occur to you that if you only see like that and superficiality, it is a reflection on you, not Tavener?

[somor98]

Actually, Tavener has no real music theory. He just says that he truely believes that Mozart is sacred music. But he has nothing to back this up. Furthermore, his focus on eastern religions reveals that his faith is not imbedded in orthodox christianity.

Also, one cannot listen for the religious element of the a musical piece; spirituality is something extra-musical.

[PegasusWhiteRose]

Er... Mozart's Requiem? That isn't sacred music?

It depends upon what you think of as sacred. If you mean belonging to a religious tradition, then a lot of his music isn't. But if you believe what is sacred is what is spiritually beautiful, then a vast amount of his music is sacred. I think that is what Tavener is saying.

[PegasusWhiteRose]

Anyway I don't see what is so wrong with what he is saying. He's saying Mozart's music is sublimely beautiful, transcendentally so. Is that so bad? Mozart was no atheist. He regarded himself as being a Catholic. What is it that Tavener is saying that people are describing as 'bollocks'? Is it his use of that dirty word 'God' that is upsetting people?

[Streetear]

f off

[PegasusWhiteRose]

New Age Mumbo Jumbo? With respect, may I suggest you look into the traditions he is speaking of? Orthodox Christianity, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism are hardly New Age. We are talking about cultures that go back hundreds of years.