An excellent composer and and all- around smart guy but the intellectual elitism - along with the ironically POPULAR cliche' political sentiments is disappointing. Can one not be an artist and still have some manners and tolerance for different views.
"If Barak Obama or John Kerry, God forbid, had said that they liked Beethoven, their poll numbers would have dropped through the floor."
What, what?? There is absolutely no grounding for that statement, no evidence to back it up (although I admit it is likely true, which gives you an idea of the kind of people we have voting in this country...). He talks about disgust with the elitism of contemporary music and yet he clearly separates himself out (and perhaps above) those who engage with pop.
@hairdressershusband Regan doted on his films many evenings in the White House - Carter doted on Mozart - There is absolutely no point in my comment. PS I have spoken with Adams on 2 or 3 occasions in SF and found him to be a "regular guy" down to earth and realistic.
I recall a well-known "classical" composer bashing pop music during a master class I took part in. I was feeling irritated that day and so said to him, "If it's so easy to write a pop hit, then write one - and then you'll have money to do your classical stuff." He didn't respond. I'm sure that, somewhere in his irrelevant heart, he knew he could never write a piece as compelling as Willie Nelson's "Crazy" -- and that no singer trained at Juilliard could sing it as well as Patsy Cline did.
@leporello56 Serious music? LOL. When you label something "serious" which is, in reality, totally irrelevant to our epoch, you seem as if you are suffering from some sort of Amadeus delusion. While it's probably true that 95% of popular music lacks artistic merit, I am positively certain that 98.9% of "classical music" is navel-gazing garbage. Try to find one living composer who can write or set a text to music and not make it sound as if some spoiled and clueless goon had too much free time.
@FiddlerAdam yes, you can ask people to appreciate and enjoy something they've never experienced. it's called asking people to have an open mind. it's a good point you make, that it's easier for people who've been surrounded by classical music to appreciate it. But the fact remains, if you want a new cultural experience, you can't just wait for it to come to you. you have to make the effort to go out and find it.
Interesting that he talks of a "suspicion about culture" in the U.S., but also laments the glorification of popular culture. I guess in his mind, "popular culture" and "culture" are two different things.
@composerclark Probably, and rightfully so. Like or not, the listening to and playing of Beethoven is an intellectual pursuit. The listening to and emulation of Kanye West is decidedly not.
I agree to disagree. I'm not going to pretend that I am familiar with Adam's music, however, comparing Britney Spears to sheer are that he creates is like comparing oranges to dragons. The pop music today is spit shinned to the point that it's over produced. Classical musicians are learned and educated to the point where the music they produce-along with the composers who write it- it becomes a discipline.
@grnhell you just compared britney spears to john adams, by noting that adams is more learned while britney's music is simple-minded and overproduced. that's EXACTLY what I was saying. the point is, when you start getting into petty qualitative assessments, you're being lazy. simply saying that Adams is "better" than Britney is just an excuse to avoid explaining why exactly you find Adams' music of greater value. if you can't explain that, you're just bullshitting to sound smarter than you are.
@PTFAbedeh if you had watched the video, Adams does compare the identity contingencies of pop culture and classical music. I merely embellished a little bit. You should take some something a bit more productive then slamming people on YouTube...like, sucking your thumb or knitting. Being a tough guy isn't your cup of tea.
@PTFAbedeh: if you had watched the video, Adams discusses the identity contingencies of politicians that listen to pop music in comparison to classical. I just embellished a little. Don't come to YouTube to be a tough guy and slam people for stating their opinions, its just not you. Instead, you can be more productive if you take up other hobbies. Like sucking your thumb or knitting.
@grnhell so i was frank. a "tough guy" would hurtle vague insults about knitting. i should also clarify that by the 4th sentence i was using "you" informally, not to refer to 'you' personally, but to a hypothetical any-person failing to do exactly what you did, which is qualify your opinion.
my comment was meant to defend what seems to me your hasty condemnation of my willingness to compare britney to adams. and if people propose broad rules about art without a rationale, yeah, i'll "slam" em.
Stimulating commentary...although Pop Culture, (whatever that is now,) seems to be paralysed by the weight of its own History. Just look at the number of tribute bands there are in the world.
amazing video. My 2 cents would say it comes down to time and marketing. People today are busy. They will go with what is shoved down their throats every day rather than go and discover on their own. Companies put MILLIONS into maketing stuff that will sell. People are sheep and equate quality with big sales (ie if it sells millions it must be good) Sorry but it isn't that way. Is some pop culture good? I would say yes! but that is rare. Highbrow or lowbrow? take your pick... I'll take both
I like pop culture. But I also like classical music and intellectual culture. I could like Lady GaGa one moment and appreciate Liszt in another. Pop culture, or high culture, it's still culture. It's still a part of being human.
What is art? What is aesthetics? Is it something to do with taste? Can a hip-hop song be artistic and intellectual, and, at the same time, appeal to the masses?
Well I don't have time to reply to any replies to my comment. I have more important things to do. :P
When I opened this video, I expected the comments to be filled with angry posts by people who only half listened to what he was saying. I was wrong. Youtube is full of surprises, ne?
I think that John Adam's implication that pop culture is almost by definition lacking in art that the intellectual element provides is patently untrue. Some things are, in fact, popular for a reason. I'm more than happy to go from Dvorak in one minute to Daft Punk in the next while recognizing both as art.
Po mo multi cultural crap tell us everything is equal , there are no such things as objective standards- no wonder we have people embracing swill as enlightened choice on their part .
Pop culture seems to demand a self-assigned value that prohibits inclusion of anything other than itself. America's hearbeat is regulated by a sense of moving away from old formulas and wholeheartedly, even blindly, embracing new ones. If that means we simultaneously overlook new ideas when they speak through "elderly" presentations (i.e. a string orchestra), it is what the pop culturists might deem an "EPIC FAIL" of American society that we disregard them. So fucking sad...
There is no such thing. The masses have always been kept uneducated and idiotic, and now that they DO get "educated", they spend 12-20 years in school, mindlessly ingesting programs and trash & never get to learn how to think critically about anything AT ALL.
The media today are much more pervasive meaning the dumbing down is much more effective.
It's NOT the masses that choose pop-culture: THEY ARE PRODUCTS of it.
@suddenlyitsobvious Absolutely true. The masses are not responsible for the content, the are only responsible for the absorption of it. It is up to us, the composers, writers, filmmakers, news presenters, media moguls, TV networks, etc. to provide the masses with quality content. If you give them Brittney Spears, they'll listen to it. If you give them McDonald's they'll eat it. So why not give them something better?
@yisacknayrabin - Because it's expensive. Economic situation distinguishes these things you're talking about and cheap stuff is always more profitable.
There is no higher cost to writing good music over bad. It doesn't cost more to write an original screenplay than it does to reboot a franchise from the 80's. The opposite is true. It is more expensive to record Britney Spears than someone else. Zimmer took a record 2+ Mil creative fee for the joke of a score to Dark Knight. The issue is that most people involved in the creation of the content (producers, studio execs) don't know the difference. They are the decision makers, not the artists.
@yisacknayrabin I don't buy the "it's not our fault" argument. Classical music is easy to access, and people reject it; they say it's boring and pretentious. The fact is, John Adams isn't "better" than Britney Spears; but, his music is more complex, his roots and influences are more sophisticated and broadminded, and his discourse is more academic. We of the masses are responsible for our actions, but classical music by and large (but not always) does take more effort to appreciate.
@jaymthegenius True, even the concept of "the masses" is too abstract a concept to be humanistic. Perhaps we should look to ourselves individually as the creators of our own culture. The more we wail about the Other of the "media" and the more we blame the world and "the forces that be," the more we mire in a pointless depression that produces nothing, adds nothing to the world of art and culture, except a dangerous ambivalence, a growing and malignant pessimism that is the refuge of the weary.
I think that Adams is right for the most part. But I don't think a politician would lose points in saying that he likes Beethoven. And there is considerably more artistic culture on TV than he thinks there is, at least in the East Coast. Barring that, Adams makes a valid argument.
what i find most interesting about this topic is the fact that I think in the 1920' and 30's, american culture more specifically music was defined by that of Gershwin. He combined jazz with classical with popular music that is still very much alive today. Even today, there are composers such as Adams, Alan Menken (disney), JOhn Williams, James Newton Howard who all hold classical elements in their composition which do somewhat bridge to the popular culture today.
When he says there's nothing on tv that has anything do with our lives, he's referring to himself and his contemporaries as composers!! And he's right, unless you count the recent movie Coco & Igor, which really was just a love story anyway that happened to be about Stravinsky's affair with Chanel! When's the last time you saw a John Adams opera or a performance of the Rite of Spring or Beethoven's 9th on HBO?
Lenny said there's no good/no bad music: there is just music--and that starts in your heart when you took your first breath and coud hear your heart syncing with your mama's heartbeat. Science tells us that hearing is the last of your senses to go when you die. So, why do we rank the quality of beat from one heart against the worth of another? Because we are clueless of the universal value of all beats and missing the boat in knowing the sacredness of all heart. Silly species.
Win he says that there's nothing on TV that has anything to do with our lives. Wow, that's quite a position take. Sitcoms are about the day to day lives of normal working class people. How many shows on science and space exploration are there? The News? So I'm not totally understanding what he means.
This is not just an American phenomenon, here in Europe the contemporary music is polarised even further and the classical contemporary one has a very narrow group of followers of a certain generic eurosound. We make the American musical society look like almost a healthy one.
SCARY! When he says " We see something suspect " later "suspicious ,subversive,morally lax about art " it sent shivers dowm my spine . Goring use to say he reached for his gun whenever he heard the word culture . Pasolini said along time ago "what Hitler does to people's bodies consumer capitalist culture does to their minds."It has already happened mostly. How sad is this .Truly endtimes !
@helpdonate1 You think lady gaga is annoying? Wait til you play pub poker. Every time I hear that prophesying "p-p-p-p-p-p-p-p", I feel another little chunk of my sanity slipping away.
God, what a douche. Having said that, I think I'm going to listen to the "Chairman Dances" because it sounds a zillion times better than his responses in interviews.
Why does Adams adopt these binary categories: popular and classical? Certainly the Minimalist movement that he comes from resulted from combining the influences of both and became a part of both. This binary (non-)thinking is typical and really this is just a whine. I do agree that capitalism is somewhat hostile to art than cannot be easily reproduced to maximize profit, but what he is saying is not based on clear thought.
It's hard to sympathize with Adams here. He sounds typical liberal left when he says "Obama or John Kerry", and "NPR Cookshow". I don't subscribe to cable TV. Mr. Adams apparently pays for 120 channels with nothing that connects to his life on them. I'm happy to feel that there are many, many Americans participating in living art in America who are not necessarily connected to this network of nothing that Adams is speaking of...Obama, NPR and cable TV to cite a few.
@OPESingers Your reasons for not sympathizing seem limited by your conception of the world that seems to be dictated by your categories. You seem to adopt the media propagated binary of "liberal" and "conservative" that places value on one, and devalues the other. Not everything can be divided up that way. I suggest you rethink your categories, or at least acknowledge that they are fabrications and cannot explain everything so clearly.
@DerangedRanger1 OOokay. I'll play by your rules for a second or two. I'll drop the whole conservative/liberal labels. I like Adams music. However, he sounds kind of silly in this clip. Adams subscribes to cable programming and says there's nothing on. Seems silly to me.
@Defiant5555 Dead wrong, His music will circulate on the internet and video streaming sites like Youtube, as long as it exists, in any shape or form.
He will be remembered in time, as one of the great American composers - Up there with the likes of Ives, Copeland, Bernstein, Carter, Sessions, Herrmann etc...
I think those who watch this video without any previous knowledge of John Adams might be a little misled by it. If you read his auto-biography, he talks about how disgusted he was with the eiltism of contemporary classical music when he was younger. He's spent his career, writing music that appeals to a broader audience. He's a composer that's spent his whole life trying to close the divide between popular and classical music. And its totally understandable that he's frustrated with pop culture.
@UnDead483 On the contrary, John just doesn't know where to look. If John had actually taken the time to listen to something like Radiohead, or Portishead, or Stars of the Lid (bit of a stretch) he would have no complaints whatsoever........
This guy is a successful superciloius elitist snob sitting there in his pop finery bemoaning that he's not as rich as a pop star! What a greedy hypocrite!
@Antarblue Can I ask you this? Would you support the assertion that the pop industry is governed by greedy, capitalist, musically ignorant executives, whereas the classical world s mostly controlled by educated and informed individuals with a deep concern for high culture. Is that misinformed?
Just playing devil's advocate there. I actually agree with you a lot more than you think.
"The music business is a plastic trench where pimps and theives run free and good men die like dogs. There is also a down side..." Hunter S. Thompson lol
I'm in the middle on this. I absolutely agree that classical music is being lost in society to music that is complete trash. However, I also believe that classical music itself isn't faring too well either. I know that I'm going to get a lot of heat for this: Minimalist music is complete garbage. Minimalists seem to think they are creative because they are "pushing the boundaries of what we call music". I saw a contemporary piece of a guy smashing a guitar. That's not music, it's a cop out.
He's right but I wouldn't stray so far as to say that his work is "classical." It could never compare to Stravinsky, Tchikovsky, Berloiz, Shubert, Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, etc. etc. Recently music is in a big pit; how the hell did we get from stuff like Bach's "Air" all the way to repeating 12 tones again and again as repetitivly as possible? Still better then rap though.
@Resident460 As I said, minimalist music isn't music. It shares qualities of music-tones, different pitches, chords etc. But then again my farts have different pitches too. I think minimalist music is people trying to find a fast track to becoming a creative person. Minimalist music isn't "enlightened", it's just what it says it is; minimalist. It's lazy.
Now, I'm sure Mr. Adams is a very intelligent person. He has the theory knowledge for sure. But his compositions aren't genius, they're silly
@MariusChamberlin How can you disregard an entire genre of music. Do you share these views with other minimalist art??? Do you even understand minimalist art?
@sheumack88 I'm not sure I understand what you mean by "disregard". If you mean that I have never listened to minimalist music ever, that would be wrong. However, to answer your question about my understanding minimalist music, I would say I don't. I have no understanding of minimalist music at all. IMO it's either the same notes repeated FOREVER, random notes played at random times, or something that isn't even music. But I'm not naive. I understand that it's art, and that's the point of art.
@sheumack88 I don't have to like it. In fact, I think that's the whole point of art. Just because you like minimalist music doesn't validate it's creativity. And just because I hate it doesn't mean it isn't music. That's the whole point of ANY art; it's not about the actual art itself, but how we humans think about it; whether it be negative or positive doesn't matter at all. The only thing that matters is that we THINK about it. Do I hate minimalist music? Yes. Does that make me close minded?
@MariusChamberlin If you're calling Adams minimalist, I have to wonder how much of his work you've actually heard. I personally am not into minimalism either, but trust me on this one; if you think Adams is minimalist, you're either listening to what everyone else tells you about him, or you've heard one of the very few Adams pieces that are actually minimalist. Most of his work is influenced by a lot more than minimalism, which is why he's been better-received than other minimalists.
@sheumack88 I don't think it does. It just makes me one side of the coin. As I said before, I don't deny that these guys have musical knowledge that vast outweighs my own, however IMO I think their music is simply noise. But like I said, that's my opinion. I'm no more wrong or right than you, and you no more than me.
@MariusChamberlin And that's the beauty of art in my opinion. Unlike math or science, art takes into account, no, art IS our opinions...on EVERYTHING. If I think that war is evil, will that affect the sum of 2+2? Of course not. 2+2 will always equal four, no matter what MY opinion is. However, if I think war is evil, will that affect the music I compose? ABSOLUTELY.
So to sum it all up, I believe that minimalist music isn't music. :)
@MariusChamberlin This is a very silly, immature comment. I have very mixed feelings about minimalist music, but it is still music. Look at where it came from in a historic perspective: it was a tonal/emotional response to the forced atonality of the previous thirty years. This is why it sounds the way it does because it strives for simplicity.
Now, John Adams is NOT a minimalist composer. He is very influenced by the style but he is not of the same group as Steve Reich and Philip Glass. Listen to his music and you would see there is much more to it (especially the wonderfully eclectic sound he is now utilizing) than just repeating 12 notes. I recommend A Flowering Tree.
'Fast Ride In A Short Machine' or whatever it's called is also just another pop song, if you want to get all snobbish about it. All this diva wants is even more attention - GFY.
To add insult to injury, film music, the last bastion of "classical" composition has been taken over in the past 10 years by very unmusical electronic effects and low vibrations closer to sound effects than to tradition music. I call it "fear music" and you can hear it 24/7 on the History Channel (that bastion of ignorance). When it hasn't just been replaced by pop hits of the 60's, 70's and 80's, of course.
The real point to be made is not about pop culture being culture or 19 century beliefs about "pure" art. The fact of the matter is that works by Beethoven and Mozart still speak to us TODAY. Fat chance that most of the "music" written today will have even the slightest relevance in just a few years
I don't know if he means it or just chose his woods purely but everyone knows united states was founded by highly intellectual people who were the intellectual elite. Same goes for those he calls religious zealots. So anyway I'd rather have him make music than comment on history
...Just look at whose funding compositions of new 'serious' classical music, symphony concerts, 'classical' music festivals today... the same multinational corporations that perpetuate 'pop' 'jazz' or any other types of music that institutionalized 'classical' music wants exclude (naively) as 'non-intellectual.'
Adams has some interesting views, but they are not sufficiently nuanced or historicized to level a critique of the cultural industry at work today. I think the view that there is a 'bifurcation in music' is flawed: pop and classical as terms have no fixed meaning. What has been handed down to us as 'classical' were itself once 'popular.' And to think that art/serious music today is immune to the logic of culture industry in a ultra-capitalist state is naive...
One of the most interesting things about this interview was what he didn't say. Every time I go to a jazz or classical performance, I can't help but notice that I'm the youngest person in the room...and I'm 43! If either style is to have a future, they're going to have to find a way to appeal to a younger audience...
Maybe modern culture has something against feeling. Actually, It is not just modern culture that fights this feeling... it is cultures that prefer to disregard life. Can warriors become "romantic" and choose to to dance with their partner instead of killing their partner?
there is lacking variety and encroaches an ever establishing idealism . . . but really high art is not as economically viable as popular culture - and it won't change unless two things occur; until pop culture starts to suffocate the aristocracy and they push their powers back in order to defend their own culture, or the masses lose a taste for pop culture - the latter is much less likely to happen
A while ago I was making love to a woman after a wrap party. She asked me to put on music (she dug tunes in the sack) so I put on a collection of the very best of Stars of the Lid. She actually asked me to change the music, then she went and put on some Beyonce or whatever it was. oh well.
P.S. Jonny Greenwood could be your saviour John. Experimental leader (with Thom) of one of the finest "pop" bands in world history, he is also a classical composer now. Did the music for "There Will Be Blood"
It would behoove u to hear this man 's compositions.
He is one of the finest composers of our time+ of our country. His music, influenced byTerry Reily,Steve Reich,Phillip Glass ,etc school of repetitions may seem sorta anal but it is precision redefined. Conducts well too!
Let's not dish on "pop music". cause it doesn't mean nothing.
I love Coldplay and I love Glenn Gould. They're not opposite.
There's shit and there's art : some classical composers suck, as well as pop composers.
But indeed, I agree that shitty pop composers are more present nowadays than shitty classical composers simply because commercially, it has become more accessible to the hear.
To understand classical music, you gotta have your hear "educated" more than for pop music...
The causes are the the lack of good education in the arts, and especially the capitalist greed for profits which leads to a media brainwashing, especially of the young. Over 99% of people in the world today for example will die without ever having become familiar with Beethoven's late string quartets which contain some of the most profound music ever written. Most people will never ever be aware that they exist. From someone who also loves the music of Bob Dylan and Jimi Hendrix, etc .
Live webcast with John Adams - Sunday 7 March 1pm GMT/8am EST
Tomorrow at at 1pm GMT/8am EST take your chance to ask John about his life and music through a live Facebook webcast, hosted by the London Symphony Orchestra. Search for London Symphony Orchestra on Facebook and find our page to post your questions and watch this exciting event live as part of his residency with us.
It seems quite repugnant to me that Adams assumes that religious zealots and venture capitalists are anti-intellectual. Sometimes the less you know about an artist the more you can enjoy their work.
You're so correct. While I'm an artist and I love art, there's a huge difference between anti-art and anti-intellectual. Further still, there's a difference between anti-modern art and anti-art. And yet further, there's a big difference between anti-modern music and anti-music. Most people's sensibilities only go so far, and - while I wish the circumstances were better for modern artists - I respect peoples' tastes.
thank god we have ur ass to pull us out of the dregs of stupidum and ignant artiszanism. memo to john : u jack off just like kanyeh west . . . one load at a time. gobble the goop . . . ok ???? !!!! ?????
I think what John Adams is saying here is a bit too harsh. Composers should not sit arrogantly on high and demand that the populace come to them, but they should look for the similarities between classical and pop music and embrace them. Steve Reich has been arguing this for years. Contemporary composers have distanced themselves from their audience to the point where the music is all intellectual and has no aesthetic value.
Also Obama listed the Bach cello suites as some of his favorite music
Modern composers have removed too much of the aesthetic aspect of music. I agree 1000% with you, but integrating pop music into serious music is not the way to mend it. Pop music as a whole is much to mindless to endure or keep its place in history like serious music is able to. In fact, it is just VERY watered down classical music. So why not integrate Classical and Romantic music into modern compositions to regain the pleasantness? That way we can avoid the shallowness of pop.
It's a hard position to take that John Adams' music is lacking in aesthetic value. And what he is saying is true. He didn't seem to be demanding anything of the populace. He was just making a point (and a true one, at that) about the state of art and culture in this country.
I was not arguing that John Adams per se is lacking in asesthetic value but as a general rule most contemporary composers do (mainly serialists or the avant garde) I happen to enjoy John Adams' music because I think he embodies my point, though he seems to be saying the opposite here.
I feel that it's unfair for you to maintain that serialists and avant garde composers lack aesthetic value. If your value wants accessible tonality, then this is a taste that belongs to you. However, you have no right to disregard the tastes of millions of people who enjoy serial and avant-garde music, and find satisfaction from it.
Very good point, I hadn't considered that when I wrote that comment being a somewhat fan of serial music myself. What I was really trying to point out was the over-intellectualization of serial music. I still maintain that there is some VERY well written serial music and I find serial music very theoretically interesting.
What similarities? There is art music, and showbiz music. Usual "pop" - a synonim of the later - is dulled down art music, and two third of the so called classical repertoire is still showbiz stuff, classical or not. And be honest, you USA people have no idea of what art (like Arte Grande) is, and you don't have the tradition either, hence you don't have the taste and the sensibility to make the right distinction. American music (as such) is all the way pop, Glass or Kanye, doesnt matter.
Charles Ives? Conlon Nancarrow? Henry Cowell? Evan Johnson? Nick Hodges? Richard Cornell? Lee Hyla? Aaron Cassidy? Have you heard the music of any of these people?
When you do, and you still maintain that Americans don't have a tradition of art, then you really are just simply an anti-American, ignorant simpleton.
(And these are just musicians ... the visual art, dance, and literature in the American tradition is just as good, and I can give you names if you'd like.)
No way. I kinda like America. You know. I've been to Montreal, and they speek french like wow. And yea, I know that Aaron Copland guy, kool dude man, kool dude.
But really.
I respect USA culture, but I can not really enjoy, because its soo different from the culture which I feel familiar with, and comfortable in. Very different approach, very different implementation, and of course very different audience.
If you read some of Adams' other interviews or writings, you'll find that he actually respects pop music a lot and wanted to integrate it into his music. I think he might have been letting off steam in this interview. It can be hard to spend a lifetime masterfully constructing brilliant compositions only to have a tiny percentage of the population pay attention enough to appreciate them.
I am surprised to hear Adams blame American "puritanism" and "anti-intellectualism" for our glorification of pop culture. Were they still alive, what do you think the Puritans would embrace more: the vulgar and hypersexualized music of today's pop stars or the music of Beethoven?
Surely the Western embrace of philosophical relativism is a factor, i.e. the idea that there is no such thing as higher or lower, better or worse, true or untrue?
I agree very wholeheartedly. I hate to start a political battle but it many intellectual liberals will take any chance they have at making a political jab even when it has no real relevance to the topic at hand. To jab puritanism and capitalism is to also jab conservatism. Notice his two politicians were both democratic nominees. Can no one see the bias? Or dare I say, anti-intellectualism in John Adams statements?
Adams begs the question: Why is his music only interesting to a high-brow audience, if that. I have been to Adams operas, and I continue to go because I would be embarrassed not to be able to say that I was up on the stuff, but do I really enjoy it? We can rattle off a bunch of artists who were popular and of the highest kind of art.
But Adams' music is precious and needs rich, academic endowments and fat-cat backers to make it work. The BAM crowd. Irving Berlin was just the better artist
In the earlier 20th century there was a healthy exchange between "serious" and "vernacular" music in America, yielding the eloquent likes of Charles Ives and Scott Joplin. For decades thereafter, many thoughtful composers on both sides of the Atlantic developed these rich possibilities in their own ways. I think that Adams is reacting properly to what might be better termed "the popular mind," and in 2009 that increasingly means a largely stupified, uninquisitive, unreflective population.
I personally would've thought Adams owed a lot to pop culture. With the exception of a few good pieces, he writes nothing but clichéd, heard-it-a-thousand-times-before crap
He does have a good point here, but I hate the implication that his music is somehow more "serious" and worthy of respect over all this "pop crap" (i know he didn't say that but he might as well have). Although I think some minimalist pieces are absolute genius, I feel that the composers usually hold on to the same kinds of aesthetics that pop musicians do.
Anyone who goes through the arduous process of writing a piece to try and convey something (be it insipid, banal & trashy) is more worthy of respect than just about any mainstream pop product. I think he's genuine and likes what he writes/vice versa. And being influenced by pop aesthetics is not the same as being nut and bolt in the machinery of this shit-factory (music industry, namely). Don't get me wrong, I would never buy an Adams CD
"Popular culture" and "high art" are just semantics. Mozart was pop, so was Wagner. The world is different now, these terms mean little anymore. Miles Davis, Frank Zappa and Squarepusher are examples of inspiring composers that embrace our age and could be defined as either pop or high art; who cares? The problem with modern 'classical' music is for many people it's quite uninspiring and caught in a retrospective web. People don't need educating as much as those composers have to up their game.
While I can agree with you about modern classical music, you are wrong about the role of the music of Mozart and Wagner during their time. Music back then, in general, was much more serious to the public than pop music is now. The whole concept of pop-culture is not even applicable in the sense that we know it today to those historical times. Pop culture and High art are not semantics. Pop culture is very far beneath high art. You cannot compare the validity of Wagner to the music of Zappa.
If you read Mozart's letters he wasn't the most serious of men. He wrote a piece of music called "lick my arse". He filled dance halls just the same way Duke Ellington did, and they wouldn't have been as tame as they are in Hollywood movies. Again I consider the notion of there being two neat catagories that creative works can fall into as being a product of psychology and semantics (reinforced endlessly), rather than having any existence independent of them.
I would tend to agree with you, except your example. I would say that Zappa is an excellent example of crossover between pop culture and high art. On one hand he has songs like "Titties and Beer" and on the other "Weasels Tearing off My Face". The later being a rock equivalent to the music of composers like Penderecki or Ligeti. However, I for one regret this divide between pop culture and high art. Why can't pop culture be sophisticated and why can't high art appeal to the masses?
Perhaps a less controversial argument could be made to make the same point; America may or may not be anti-intellectual but there is certainly a bias against what Adams defines of 'culture' (poetry, classical music etc.). Obviously many viewers disagree with Adams narrow definition that excludes any "popular" influence.
This comment has received too many negative votesshow
Psst, hey dude, FYI - "anti-intellectualism" is not the problem... it's that you're a poor, bitter, disgustingly arrogant douchebag who feels disconnected from the rest of your species and appeals to "intelligence" as a way to feel superior over all those kids who bullied you in school. Oh, you're so much more sophisticated than those silly kids out having a good time... you're above all that.
I wouldn't want to know this person in real life. Serious issues, rotten to the core. Poor guy.
in a sense I agree with you "murtsworld", but in a sense I agree with "sipote." It was not as mass-produced and distributed as today, but many of the older pieces we call "classics" *were* in fact the anachronistic equivalent of what we might call "pop" today. In a way it's comparing apples and oranges- but I think there r dangers in ignoring both similarities and differences....
Gershwin was one of the foremost pop composers of his day. I suppose film scores would be considered pop culture given their association with films, and of the composers active in recent years, I dare you to find a better technician than Jerry Goldsmith or John Williams.
@Antarblue I agree, Antarblue. But high culture plays an important role in society, which relates to values cherished by the intelectual elite, such as rigor, calculated variation of tradition and reinterpretation of the canon. Then, 19th century's "axiology" is not a problem, it's a way to glorify specific works of art and artists beyond the pure financial perspective. We can blame the Aesthetics or French Revolution; this will not change the strength of high culture.
Keep telling yourself that. This is not what the discussion is about however. It's about people who love and, perform and study the classics being treated like pariahs in US mainstream society. I highly recommend "The Age of American Unreason" by Susan Jacoby on the subject.
"2. from a social science point of view there is no judging whether music cultures are high or low or have artistic merit. It's about how culture functions in society. The judgements are made by the members of the culture."
"3, 'pop' and 'classical' are 20th terms that reflect class struggle. Beethoven and Strauss were the pop music of their times."
Marxist social science bollocks.
Who said I was coming from a social science perspective?
@Antarblue Classical music, is defined by the complexity and craft behind the composition and performances, not how popular or esoteric it is. It is down to the very structure of the music, and the guile behind its creation, not the public's love or rejection of it.
But I agree with his aproach, I mean I aprecciate what he is trying to do
7of23 2 weeks ago
This has been flagged as spam show
His music bores me, he has no genius
7of23 2 weeks ago
This has been flagged as spam show
His music bores me, he has no genius
7of23 2 weeks ago
His music bores me, he has no genius
7of23 2 weeks ago
An excellent composer and and all- around smart guy but the intellectual elitism - along with the ironically POPULAR cliche' political sentiments is disappointing. Can one not be an artist and still have some manners and tolerance for different views.
prom9etheus 3 weeks ago
"If Barak Obama or John Kerry, God forbid, had said that they liked Beethoven, their poll numbers would have dropped through the floor."
What, what?? There is absolutely no grounding for that statement, no evidence to back it up (although I admit it is likely true, which gives you an idea of the kind of people we have voting in this country...). He talks about disgust with the elitism of contemporary music and yet he clearly separates himself out (and perhaps above) those who engage with pop.
hairdressershusband 1 month ago
@hairdressershusband Regan doted on his films many evenings in the White House - Carter doted on Mozart - There is absolutely no point in my comment. PS I have spoken with Adams on 2 or 3 occasions in SF and found him to be a "regular guy" down to earth and realistic.
StanGay 3 days ago
"Lingering anti-intellectualism has a great presence in America" - Preach on brotha!
stayonmytoes 1 month ago
i dislike this
stinkpickle1000 2 months ago
@DeathMetalDeth Jazz is often called the classical music of america
superkulmedkniv25 3 months ago
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dlo693 2 months ago
Lol classical? Haha. Good joke.
Vesivian 4 months ago
I recall a well-known "classical" composer bashing pop music during a master class I took part in. I was feeling irritated that day and so said to him, "If it's so easy to write a pop hit, then write one - and then you'll have money to do your classical stuff." He didn't respond. I'm sure that, somewhere in his irrelevant heart, he knew he could never write a piece as compelling as Willie Nelson's "Crazy" -- and that no singer trained at Juilliard could sing it as well as Patsy Cline did.
gallowswood 6 months ago
@gallowswood No.
Huddiethegreat 6 months ago
@gallowswood if you have ever tried to compose and publish serious music, you'd get it.
leporello56 5 months ago
@leporello56 Serious music? LOL. When you label something "serious" which is, in reality, totally irrelevant to our epoch, you seem as if you are suffering from some sort of Amadeus delusion. While it's probably true that 95% of popular music lacks artistic merit, I am positively certain that 98.9% of "classical music" is navel-gazing garbage. Try to find one living composer who can write or set a text to music and not make it sound as if some spoiled and clueless goon had too much free time.
gallowswood 5 months ago
@gallowswood The last part is because Juilliard's vocal program is known more for destroying your voice than nurturing it.
Sorry, couldn't resist.
menschmaschine5 4 months ago
Comment removed
grnhell 7 months ago
@FiddlerAdam yes, you can ask people to appreciate and enjoy something they've never experienced. it's called asking people to have an open mind. it's a good point you make, that it's easier for people who've been surrounded by classical music to appreciate it. But the fact remains, if you want a new cultural experience, you can't just wait for it to come to you. you have to make the effort to go out and find it.
PTFAbedeh 7 months ago
Interesting that he talks of a "suspicion about culture" in the U.S., but also laments the glorification of popular culture. I guess in his mind, "popular culture" and "culture" are two different things.
composerclark 8 months ago
@composerclark Probably, and rightfully so. Like or not, the listening to and playing of Beethoven is an intellectual pursuit. The listening to and emulation of Kanye West is decidedly not.
ensiform 8 months ago
I don't think it's about giving something that is of quality to the society.
If you put mass-consumption asside, you still have "fast consumption" by the individuals... and it's because of "the masses".
I believe that, sometimes, you need to not consume "it" in order to be happy.
I mean, if you drink a beer after a good day of work, that beer is worth it.
If you drink beer everyday, then... it's the opposite.
Supposedly, people like to "drink beer all day long and not wait for the proper time".
Ryusuken55 8 months ago
So, religious zeal and venture capitalism are anti-intellectual?
icemanfsu 9 months ago 2
IE: you're attempting to compare a hag with fake boobs to an art that has transcended centuries....
grnhell 9 months ago
I agree to disagree. I'm not going to pretend that I am familiar with Adam's music, however, comparing Britney Spears to sheer are that he creates is like comparing oranges to dragons. The pop music today is spit shinned to the point that it's over produced. Classical musicians are learned and educated to the point where the music they produce-along with the composers who write it- it becomes a discipline.
grnhell 9 months ago
@grnhell you just compared britney spears to john adams, by noting that adams is more learned while britney's music is simple-minded and overproduced. that's EXACTLY what I was saying. the point is, when you start getting into petty qualitative assessments, you're being lazy. simply saying that Adams is "better" than Britney is just an excuse to avoid explaining why exactly you find Adams' music of greater value. if you can't explain that, you're just bullshitting to sound smarter than you are.
PTFAbedeh 7 months ago
@PTFAbedeh if you had watched the video, Adams does compare the identity contingencies of pop culture and classical music. I merely embellished a little bit. You should take some something a bit more productive then slamming people on YouTube...like, sucking your thumb or knitting. Being a tough guy isn't your cup of tea.
grnhell 7 months ago
@PTFAbedeh: if you had watched the video, Adams discusses the identity contingencies of politicians that listen to pop music in comparison to classical. I just embellished a little. Don't come to YouTube to be a tough guy and slam people for stating their opinions, its just not you. Instead, you can be more productive if you take up other hobbies. Like sucking your thumb or knitting.
grnhell 7 months ago
@grnhell so i was frank. a "tough guy" would hurtle vague insults about knitting. i should also clarify that by the 4th sentence i was using "you" informally, not to refer to 'you' personally, but to a hypothetical any-person failing to do exactly what you did, which is qualify your opinion.
my comment was meant to defend what seems to me your hasty condemnation of my willingness to compare britney to adams. and if people propose broad rules about art without a rationale, yeah, i'll "slam" em.
PTFAbedeh 6 months ago
Stimulating commentary...although Pop Culture, (whatever that is now,) seems to be paralysed by the weight of its own History. Just look at the number of tribute bands there are in the world.
Perkisound 10 months ago
amazing video. My 2 cents would say it comes down to time and marketing. People today are busy. They will go with what is shoved down their throats every day rather than go and discover on their own. Companies put MILLIONS into maketing stuff that will sell. People are sheep and equate quality with big sales (ie if it sells millions it must be good) Sorry but it isn't that way. Is some pop culture good? I would say yes! but that is rare. Highbrow or lowbrow? take your pick... I'll take both
uneedtherapy42 10 months ago 2
shout out to my boy kanye west. represent john adams
edku1 11 months ago 2
I like pop culture. But I also like classical music and intellectual culture. I could like Lady GaGa one moment and appreciate Liszt in another. Pop culture, or high culture, it's still culture. It's still a part of being human.
What is art? What is aesthetics? Is it something to do with taste? Can a hip-hop song be artistic and intellectual, and, at the same time, appeal to the masses?
Well I don't have time to reply to any replies to my comment. I have more important things to do. :P
dasmysteryman12 11 months ago
I like Stewart Copeland.
WHO AM I, REALLY??!
NotOrdinaryInGames 1 year ago
@NotOrdinaryInGames - Whooo aaare you? Who, who - Who, who :)
JonasGencer 1 year ago
When I opened this video, I expected the comments to be filled with angry posts by people who only half listened to what he was saying. I was wrong. Youtube is full of surprises, ne?
I think that John Adam's implication that pop culture is almost by definition lacking in art that the intellectual element provides is patently untrue. Some things are, in fact, popular for a reason. I'm more than happy to go from Dvorak in one minute to Daft Punk in the next while recognizing both as art.
NemoMentisson 1 year ago
Po mo multi cultural crap tell us everything is equal , there are no such things as objective standards- no wonder we have people embracing swill as enlightened choice on their part .
YerJob 1 year ago
If they will take anything you give to them, hi or low, that says little favorable for their character.
YerJob 1 year ago
Pop culture seems to demand a self-assigned value that prohibits inclusion of anything other than itself. America's hearbeat is regulated by a sense of moving away from old formulas and wholeheartedly, even blindly, embracing new ones. If that means we simultaneously overlook new ideas when they speak through "elderly" presentations (i.e. a string orchestra), it is what the pop culturists might deem an "EPIC FAIL" of American society that we disregard them. So fucking sad...
yisacknayrabin 1 year ago
"Lingering anti-intellectualism"?
There is no such thing. The masses have always been kept uneducated and idiotic, and now that they DO get "educated", they spend 12-20 years in school, mindlessly ingesting programs and trash & never get to learn how to think critically about anything AT ALL.
The media today are much more pervasive meaning the dumbing down is much more effective.
It's NOT the masses that choose pop-culture: THEY ARE PRODUCTS of it.
suddenlyitsobvious 1 year ago
@suddenlyitsobvious Absolutely true. The masses are not responsible for the content, the are only responsible for the absorption of it. It is up to us, the composers, writers, filmmakers, news presenters, media moguls, TV networks, etc. to provide the masses with quality content. If you give them Brittney Spears, they'll listen to it. If you give them McDonald's they'll eat it. So why not give them something better?
yisacknayrabin 1 year ago 22
@yisacknayrabin - Because it's expensive. Economic situation distinguishes these things you're talking about and cheap stuff is always more profitable.
JonasGencer 1 year ago
There is no higher cost to writing good music over bad. It doesn't cost more to write an original screenplay than it does to reboot a franchise from the 80's. The opposite is true. It is more expensive to record Britney Spears than someone else. Zimmer took a record 2+ Mil creative fee for the joke of a score to Dark Knight. The issue is that most people involved in the creation of the content (producers, studio execs) don't know the difference. They are the decision makers, not the artists.
yisacknayrabin 11 months ago
@yisacknayrabin I don't buy the "it's not our fault" argument. Classical music is easy to access, and people reject it; they say it's boring and pretentious. The fact is, John Adams isn't "better" than Britney Spears; but, his music is more complex, his roots and influences are more sophisticated and broadminded, and his discourse is more academic. We of the masses are responsible for our actions, but classical music by and large (but not always) does take more effort to appreciate.
PTFAbedeh 9 months ago
@PTFAbedeh
Even the concept of "the masses" is irrelevant, because "the masses" are composed of unique and irreplaceable individuals.
jaymthegenius 9 months ago
@jaymthegenius True, even the concept of "the masses" is too abstract a concept to be humanistic. Perhaps we should look to ourselves individually as the creators of our own culture. The more we wail about the Other of the "media" and the more we blame the world and "the forces that be," the more we mire in a pointless depression that produces nothing, adds nothing to the world of art and culture, except a dangerous ambivalence, a growing and malignant pessimism that is the refuge of the weary.
PTFAbedeh 9 months ago
@jaymthegenius indeed , sociology only look at the group not the individual , but anyhoo social science leads to "masses control"
captainparady 9 months ago
I think that Adams is right for the most part. But I don't think a politician would lose points in saying that he likes Beethoven. And there is considerably more artistic culture on TV than he thinks there is, at least in the East Coast. Barring that, Adams makes a valid argument.
MrCC379 1 year ago
what i find most interesting about this topic is the fact that I think in the 1920' and 30's, american culture more specifically music was defined by that of Gershwin. He combined jazz with classical with popular music that is still very much alive today. Even today, there are composers such as Adams, Alan Menken (disney), JOhn Williams, James Newton Howard who all hold classical elements in their composition which do somewhat bridge to the popular culture today.
mlr2107 1 year ago
When he says there's nothing on tv that has anything do with our lives, he's referring to himself and his contemporaries as composers!! And he's right, unless you count the recent movie Coco & Igor, which really was just a love story anyway that happened to be about Stravinsky's affair with Chanel! When's the last time you saw a John Adams opera or a performance of the Rite of Spring or Beethoven's 9th on HBO?
petezilla 1 year ago
Lenny said there's no good/no bad music: there is just music--and that starts in your heart when you took your first breath and coud hear your heart syncing with your mama's heartbeat. Science tells us that hearing is the last of your senses to go when you die. So, why do we rank the quality of beat from one heart against the worth of another? Because we are clueless of the universal value of all beats and missing the boat in knowing the sacredness of all heart. Silly species.
cieobt2 1 year ago
Our best American composer. Nobody's ever been better.
ChollieD 1 year ago
Win he says that there's nothing on TV that has anything to do with our lives. Wow, that's quite a position take. Sitcoms are about the day to day lives of normal working class people. How many shows on science and space exploration are there? The News? So I'm not totally understanding what he means.
thedude69ification 1 year ago
This is not just an American phenomenon, here in Europe the contemporary music is polarised even further and the classical contemporary one has a very narrow group of followers of a certain generic eurosound. We make the American musical society look like almost a healthy one.
furiasha 1 year ago
SCARY! When he says " We see something suspect " later "suspicious ,subversive,morally lax about art " it sent shivers dowm my spine . Goring use to say he reached for his gun whenever he heard the word culture . Pasolini said along time ago "what Hitler does to people's bodies consumer capitalist culture does to their minds."It has already happened mostly. How sad is this .Truly endtimes !
lovesGenet 1 year ago
Does Mr Adams seriously not realise that his music is given "enormous prestige" over other, not to mention far better, American composers?
flammesombres 1 year ago
Reminds me of Hermann Goering's most famous quote that he never actually said.
"Wenn ich Kultur höre ... entsichere ich meinen Browning!" - ("Whenever I hear [the word] 'culture'... I remove the safety from my Browning!")
therockhopper 1 year ago
He is absolutely right.
artbrent23 1 year ago
What I cant fathom is how the mass can put Lady Gaga so high up like shes some sort of god. bunch of slaves
helpdonate1 1 year ago
@helpdonate1 You think lady gaga is annoying? Wait til you play pub poker. Every time I hear that prophesying "p-p-p-p-p-p-p-p", I feel another little chunk of my sanity slipping away.
HaniiPuppy 1 year ago
God, what a douche. Having said that, I think I'm going to listen to the "Chairman Dances" because it sounds a zillion times better than his responses in interviews.
AlbertoAntonio6 1 year ago
Why does Adams adopt these binary categories: popular and classical? Certainly the Minimalist movement that he comes from resulted from combining the influences of both and became a part of both. This binary (non-)thinking is typical and really this is just a whine. I do agree that capitalism is somewhat hostile to art than cannot be easily reproduced to maximize profit, but what he is saying is not based on clear thought.
DerangedRanger1 1 year ago
@DerangedRanger1
Very well said indeed.
flammesombres 1 year ago
@DerangedRanger1 because that's how to engage with about 99% of human discourse: binary categories.
gallowswood 1 year ago
It's hard to sympathize with Adams here. He sounds typical liberal left when he says "Obama or John Kerry", and "NPR Cookshow". I don't subscribe to cable TV. Mr. Adams apparently pays for 120 channels with nothing that connects to his life on them. I'm happy to feel that there are many, many Americans participating in living art in America who are not necessarily connected to this network of nothing that Adams is speaking of...Obama, NPR and cable TV to cite a few.
OPESingers 1 year ago
@OPESingers Your reasons for not sympathizing seem limited by your conception of the world that seems to be dictated by your categories. You seem to adopt the media propagated binary of "liberal" and "conservative" that places value on one, and devalues the other. Not everything can be divided up that way. I suggest you rethink your categories, or at least acknowledge that they are fabrications and cannot explain everything so clearly.
DerangedRanger1 1 year ago
@DerangedRanger1 OOokay. I'll play by your rules for a second or two. I'll drop the whole conservative/liberal labels. I like Adams music. However, he sounds kind of silly in this clip. Adams subscribes to cable programming and says there's nothing on. Seems silly to me.
OPESingers 1 year ago
@OPESingers I agree that he sounds stupid. But the main reason is because of his binary thinking (similar to what you had displayed) and whining.
DerangedRanger1 1 year ago
John Adams will die and his music will circle the drains of Conservatories.
Defiant5555 1 year ago
@Defiant5555 Dead wrong, His music will circulate on the internet and video streaming sites like Youtube, as long as it exists, in any shape or form.
He will be remembered in time, as one of the great American composers - Up there with the likes of Ives, Copeland, Bernstein, Carter, Sessions, Herrmann etc...
RogueRotting360 1 year ago
I think those who watch this video without any previous knowledge of John Adams might be a little misled by it. If you read his auto-biography, he talks about how disgusted he was with the eiltism of contemporary classical music when he was younger. He's spent his career, writing music that appeals to a broader audience. He's a composer that's spent his whole life trying to close the divide between popular and classical music. And its totally understandable that he's frustrated with pop culture.
UnDead483 1 year ago 39
@UnDead483 On the contrary, John just doesn't know where to look. If John had actually taken the time to listen to something like Radiohead, or Portishead, or Stars of the Lid (bit of a stretch) he would have no complaints whatsoever........
JonnyCashmore 7 months ago
This guy is a successful superciloius elitist snob sitting there in his pop finery bemoaning that he's not as rich as a pop star! What a greedy hypocrite!
Antarblue 1 year ago
@Antarblue Can I ask you this? Would you support the assertion that the pop industry is governed by greedy, capitalist, musically ignorant executives, whereas the classical world s mostly controlled by educated and informed individuals with a deep concern for high culture. Is that misinformed?
Just playing devil's advocate there. I actually agree with you a lot more than you think.
RogueRotting360 1 year ago
"The music business is a plastic trench where pimps and theives run free and good men die like dogs. There is also a down side..." Hunter S. Thompson lol
Antarblue 1 year ago 2
@Antarblue Couldn't agree more. Probably best to stay self-employed and independent than get sucked by any of the Machiavellian corporate labels.
RogueRotting360 1 year ago
hahaha i LOVE him haha
CAMB1231 1 year ago
..... therefore culture is bad.
-_-
kmizze 1 year ago
JOHN ADAMS IS STILL ALIVE!?!?!?!??? I THOUGHT HE DIED LIKE 300 YEARS AGO!!!!!!!
piggemz 1 year ago
I have hope that Eric Whitacre and those like him will ignite a fire in society and open their ears again to GOOD music.
itsmrGuy 1 year ago
I'm in the middle on this. I absolutely agree that classical music is being lost in society to music that is complete trash. However, I also believe that classical music itself isn't faring too well either. I know that I'm going to get a lot of heat for this: Minimalist music is complete garbage. Minimalists seem to think they are creative because they are "pushing the boundaries of what we call music". I saw a contemporary piece of a guy smashing a guitar. That's not music, it's a cop out.
MariusChamberlin 1 year ago
He's right but I wouldn't stray so far as to say that his work is "classical." It could never compare to Stravinsky, Tchikovsky, Berloiz, Shubert, Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, etc. etc. Recently music is in a big pit; how the hell did we get from stuff like Bach's "Air" all the way to repeating 12 tones again and again as repetitivly as possible? Still better then rap though.
Resident460 1 year ago
@Resident460 As I said, minimalist music isn't music. It shares qualities of music-tones, different pitches, chords etc. But then again my farts have different pitches too. I think minimalist music is people trying to find a fast track to becoming a creative person. Minimalist music isn't "enlightened", it's just what it says it is; minimalist. It's lazy.
Now, I'm sure Mr. Adams is a very intelligent person. He has the theory knowledge for sure. But his compositions aren't genius, they're silly
MariusChamberlin 1 year ago
@MariusChamberlin How can you disregard an entire genre of music. Do you share these views with other minimalist art??? Do you even understand minimalist art?
sheumack88 1 year ago
@sheumack88 I'm not sure I understand what you mean by "disregard". If you mean that I have never listened to minimalist music ever, that would be wrong. However, to answer your question about my understanding minimalist music, I would say I don't. I have no understanding of minimalist music at all. IMO it's either the same notes repeated FOREVER, random notes played at random times, or something that isn't even music. But I'm not naive. I understand that it's art, and that's the point of art.
MariusChamberlin 1 year ago
@MariusChamberlin Its good elevator music :)
Resident460 1 year ago
@Resident460 Heheh.
MariusChamberlin 1 year ago
@sheumack88 I don't have to like it. In fact, I think that's the whole point of art. Just because you like minimalist music doesn't validate it's creativity. And just because I hate it doesn't mean it isn't music. That's the whole point of ANY art; it's not about the actual art itself, but how we humans think about it; whether it be negative or positive doesn't matter at all. The only thing that matters is that we THINK about it. Do I hate minimalist music? Yes. Does that make me close minded?
MariusChamberlin 1 year ago
@MariusChamberlin If you're calling Adams minimalist, I have to wonder how much of his work you've actually heard. I personally am not into minimalism either, but trust me on this one; if you think Adams is minimalist, you're either listening to what everyone else tells you about him, or you've heard one of the very few Adams pieces that are actually minimalist. Most of his work is influenced by a lot more than minimalism, which is why he's been better-received than other minimalists.
BenMcCormack91 1 year ago
@sheumack88 I don't think it does. It just makes me one side of the coin. As I said before, I don't deny that these guys have musical knowledge that vast outweighs my own, however IMO I think their music is simply noise. But like I said, that's my opinion. I'm no more wrong or right than you, and you no more than me.
MariusChamberlin 1 year ago
@MariusChamberlin And that's the beauty of art in my opinion. Unlike math or science, art takes into account, no, art IS our opinions...on EVERYTHING. If I think that war is evil, will that affect the sum of 2+2? Of course not. 2+2 will always equal four, no matter what MY opinion is. However, if I think war is evil, will that affect the music I compose? ABSOLUTELY.
So to sum it all up, I believe that minimalist music isn't music. :)
MariusChamberlin 1 year ago
@MariusChamberlin This is a very silly, immature comment. I have very mixed feelings about minimalist music, but it is still music. Look at where it came from in a historic perspective: it was a tonal/emotional response to the forced atonality of the previous thirty years. This is why it sounds the way it does because it strives for simplicity.
Dcomp29 1 year ago
Now, John Adams is NOT a minimalist composer. He is very influenced by the style but he is not of the same group as Steve Reich and Philip Glass. Listen to his music and you would see there is much more to it (especially the wonderfully eclectic sound he is now utilizing) than just repeating 12 notes. I recommend A Flowering Tree.
Dcomp29 1 year ago
'Fast Ride In A Short Machine' or whatever it's called is also just another pop song, if you want to get all snobbish about it. All this diva wants is even more attention - GFY.
alternativeyoga 1 year ago
To add insult to injury, film music, the last bastion of "classical" composition has been taken over in the past 10 years by very unmusical electronic effects and low vibrations closer to sound effects than to tradition music. I call it "fear music" and you can hear it 24/7 on the History Channel (that bastion of ignorance). When it hasn't just been replaced by pop hits of the 60's, 70's and 80's, of course.
baracine 1 year ago
smug asshole.
iamflobot 1 year ago
The real point to be made is not about pop culture being culture or 19 century beliefs about "pure" art. The fact of the matter is that works by Beethoven and Mozart still speak to us TODAY. Fat chance that most of the "music" written today will have even the slightest relevance in just a few years
jks625 1 year ago
I don't know if he means it or just chose his woods purely but everyone knows united states was founded by highly intellectual people who were the intellectual elite. Same goes for those he calls religious zealots. So anyway I'd rather have him make music than comment on history
StopFear 1 year ago
...Just look at whose funding compositions of new 'serious' classical music, symphony concerts, 'classical' music festivals today... the same multinational corporations that perpetuate 'pop' 'jazz' or any other types of music that institutionalized 'classical' music wants exclude (naively) as 'non-intellectual.'
hsien32 1 year ago
Adams has some interesting views, but they are not sufficiently nuanced or historicized to level a critique of the cultural industry at work today. I think the view that there is a 'bifurcation in music' is flawed: pop and classical as terms have no fixed meaning. What has been handed down to us as 'classical' were itself once 'popular.' And to think that art/serious music today is immune to the logic of culture industry in a ultra-capitalist state is naive...
hsien32 1 year ago
One of the most interesting things about this interview was what he didn't say. Every time I go to a jazz or classical performance, I can't help but notice that I'm the youngest person in the room...and I'm 43! If either style is to have a future, they're going to have to find a way to appeal to a younger audience...
Modes9 1 year ago
Maybe modern culture has something against feeling. Actually, It is not just modern culture that fights this feeling... it is cultures that prefer to disregard life. Can warriors become "romantic" and choose to to dance with their partner instead of killing their partner?
elizabethlerer 1 year ago
The united states was founded by anti-intellectuals?
kraken138 1 year ago
there is lacking variety and encroaches an ever establishing idealism . . . but really high art is not as economically viable as popular culture - and it won't change unless two things occur; until pop culture starts to suffocate the aristocracy and they push their powers back in order to defend their own culture, or the masses lose a taste for pop culture - the latter is much less likely to happen
JDazell 1 year ago
P.S. check out my ambient/classical vibes at myspace.
JonnyCashmore 1 year ago
A while ago I was making love to a woman after a wrap party. She asked me to put on music (she dug tunes in the sack) so I put on a collection of the very best of Stars of the Lid. She actually asked me to change the music, then she went and put on some Beyonce or whatever it was. oh well.
P.S. Jonny Greenwood could be your saviour John. Experimental leader (with Thom) of one of the finest "pop" bands in world history, he is also a classical composer now. Did the music for "There Will Be Blood"
JonnyCashmore 1 year ago
It would behoove u to hear this man 's compositions.
He is one of the finest composers of our time+ of our country. His music, influenced byTerry Reily,Steve Reich,Phillip Glass ,etc school of repetitions may seem sorta anal but it is precision redefined. Conducts well too!
mindcontrolsalsa 1 year ago
Let's not dish on "pop music". cause it doesn't mean nothing.
I love Coldplay and I love Glenn Gould. They're not opposite.
There's shit and there's art : some classical composers suck, as well as pop composers.
But indeed, I agree that shitty pop composers are more present nowadays than shitty classical composers simply because commercially, it has become more accessible to the hear.
To understand classical music, you gotta have your hear "educated" more than for pop music...
Frederikamusic 1 year ago
The causes are the the lack of good education in the arts, and especially the capitalist greed for profits which leads to a media brainwashing, especially of the young. Over 99% of people in the world today for example will die without ever having become familiar with Beethoven's late string quartets which contain some of the most profound music ever written. Most people will never ever be aware that they exist. From someone who also loves the music of Bob Dylan and Jimi Hendrix, etc .
lewars1912 1 year ago
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Lso 1 year ago
"genu whine ly", anyone that prounces this word like that has a "morally lax" education, he is a pseudo intellectual
carolingianguy 1 year ago
It seems quite repugnant to me that Adams assumes that religious zealots and venture capitalists are anti-intellectual. Sometimes the less you know about an artist the more you can enjoy their work.
Flanson 1 year ago 2
@Flanson
You're so correct. While I'm an artist and I love art, there's a huge difference between anti-art and anti-intellectual. Further still, there's a difference between anti-modern art and anti-art. And yet further, there's a big difference between anti-modern music and anti-music. Most people's sensibilities only go so far, and - while I wish the circumstances were better for modern artists - I respect peoples' tastes.
De gustibus non est disputandum!
toriant36 1 year ago
The intellectual content of a song is based just as much on the listener as the musician.
TheZombieJC 2 years ago
thank god we have ur ass to pull us out of the dregs of stupidum and ignant artiszanism. memo to john : u jack off just like kanyeh west . . . one load at a time. gobble the goop . . . ok ???? !!!! ?????
avazbone 2 years ago
I agree with John all the way - POP CULTURE feeds us trash
Zephyrwood 2 years ago 13
@Zephyrwood You, and all the people who "like this", are elitists and musical snobs.
DerangedRanger1 1 year ago
I think what John Adams is saying here is a bit too harsh. Composers should not sit arrogantly on high and demand that the populace come to them, but they should look for the similarities between classical and pop music and embrace them. Steve Reich has been arguing this for years. Contemporary composers have distanced themselves from their audience to the point where the music is all intellectual and has no aesthetic value.
Also Obama listed the Bach cello suites as some of his favorite music
JosephGlaser 2 years ago 2
@JosephGlaser
Modern composers have removed too much of the aesthetic aspect of music. I agree 1000% with you, but integrating pop music into serious music is not the way to mend it. Pop music as a whole is much to mindless to endure or keep its place in history like serious music is able to. In fact, it is just VERY watered down classical music. So why not integrate Classical and Romantic music into modern compositions to regain the pleasantness? That way we can avoid the shallowness of pop.
jth0134 2 years ago
See mid - period King Crimson...'Islands'
or 'Larks Tongue in Aspic'............They worked the two approaches very very well.
12347771 2 years ago
@JosephGlaser
It's a hard position to take that John Adams' music is lacking in aesthetic value. And what he is saying is true. He didn't seem to be demanding anything of the populace. He was just making a point (and a true one, at that) about the state of art and culture in this country.
InternetTrafficCop 2 years ago 8
I was not arguing that John Adams per se is lacking in asesthetic value but as a general rule most contemporary composers do (mainly serialists or the avant garde) I happen to enjoy John Adams' music because I think he embodies my point, though he seems to be saying the opposite here.
Sorry for any confusion.
JosephGlaser 2 years ago
@JosephGlaser
I feel that it's unfair for you to maintain that serialists and avant garde composers lack aesthetic value. If your value wants accessible tonality, then this is a taste that belongs to you. However, you have no right to disregard the tastes of millions of people who enjoy serial and avant-garde music, and find satisfaction from it.
toriant36 1 year ago
@ toriant36
Very good point, I hadn't considered that when I wrote that comment being a somewhat fan of serial music myself. What I was really trying to point out was the over-intellectualization of serial music. I still maintain that there is some VERY well written serial music and I find serial music very theoretically interesting.
JosephGlaser 1 year ago
What similarities? There is art music, and showbiz music. Usual "pop" - a synonim of the later - is dulled down art music, and two third of the so called classical repertoire is still showbiz stuff, classical or not. And be honest, you USA people have no idea of what art (like Arte Grande) is, and you don't have the tradition either, hence you don't have the taste and the sensibility to make the right distinction. American music (as such) is all the way pop, Glass or Kanye, doesnt matter.
reallyhatejazz 2 years ago
@reallyhatejazz
Charles Ives? Conlon Nancarrow? Henry Cowell? Evan Johnson? Nick Hodges? Richard Cornell? Lee Hyla? Aaron Cassidy? Have you heard the music of any of these people?
When you do, and you still maintain that Americans don't have a tradition of art, then you really are just simply an anti-American, ignorant simpleton.
(And these are just musicians ... the visual art, dance, and literature in the American tradition is just as good, and I can give you names if you'd like.)
toriant36 1 year ago
No way. I kinda like America. You know. I've been to Montreal, and they speek french like wow. And yea, I know that Aaron Copland guy, kool dude man, kool dude.
But really.
I respect USA culture, but I can not really enjoy, because its soo different from the culture which I feel familiar with, and comfortable in. Very different approach, very different implementation, and of course very different audience.
reallyhatejazz 1 year ago
@JosephGlaser
If you read some of Adams' other interviews or writings, you'll find that he actually respects pop music a lot and wanted to integrate it into his music. I think he might have been letting off steam in this interview. It can be hard to spend a lifetime masterfully constructing brilliant compositions only to have a tiny percentage of the population pay attention enough to appreciate them.
djjmmm 1 year ago
american master
DIEZAUBERFLOTEMENSCH 2 years ago
ah music and politics.........
Elipsysmarketing 2 years ago
Adams is a genius, I completely agree.
MrChris1125 2 years ago
Lol, I didn't think the first people who first came here were anti-intellectual, but the people who are here now are!
owchywawa 2 years ago
I am surprised to hear Adams blame American "puritanism" and "anti-intellectualism" for our glorification of pop culture. Were they still alive, what do you think the Puritans would embrace more: the vulgar and hypersexualized music of today's pop stars or the music of Beethoven?
Surely the Western embrace of philosophical relativism is a factor, i.e. the idea that there is no such thing as higher or lower, better or worse, true or untrue?
cnasty1 2 years ago
I agree very wholeheartedly. I hate to start a political battle but it many intellectual liberals will take any chance they have at making a political jab even when it has no real relevance to the topic at hand. To jab puritanism and capitalism is to also jab conservatism. Notice his two politicians were both democratic nominees. Can no one see the bias? Or dare I say, anti-intellectualism in John Adams statements?
frontensemble077 2 years ago
Adams begs the question: Why is his music only interesting to a high-brow audience, if that. I have been to Adams operas, and I continue to go because I would be embarrassed not to be able to say that I was up on the stuff, but do I really enjoy it? We can rattle off a bunch of artists who were popular and of the highest kind of art.
But Adams' music is precious and needs rich, academic endowments and fat-cat backers to make it work. The BAM crowd. Irving Berlin was just the better artist
mwoldin 2 years ago
In the earlier 20th century there was a healthy exchange between "serious" and "vernacular" music in America, yielding the eloquent likes of Charles Ives and Scott Joplin. For decades thereafter, many thoughtful composers on both sides of the Atlantic developed these rich possibilities in their own ways. I think that Adams is reacting properly to what might be better termed "the popular mind," and in 2009 that increasingly means a largely stupified, uninquisitive, unreflective population.
PolkRidgeAesthete 2 years ago
what's the point of this statement??
OMG what a waste of time once again trying to define that something should or should not be considered culture/art... :/
kids can take their time today and listen from Wagner to Deicide, from Japanese Gagaku to cuban or beethoven
uburei 2 years ago
I personally would've thought Adams owed a lot to pop culture. With the exception of a few good pieces, he writes nothing but clichéd, heard-it-a-thousand-times-before crap
flammesombres 2 years ago
Yes, I've heard one piece so far I actually like. Most of it I couldn't sit through. I prefer what he's saying here to most of his music
GreggaryPeccary 2 years ago
He does have a good point here, but I hate the implication that his music is somehow more "serious" and worthy of respect over all this "pop crap" (i know he didn't say that but he might as well have). Although I think some minimalist pieces are absolute genius, I feel that the composers usually hold on to the same kinds of aesthetics that pop musicians do.
flammesombres 2 years ago
Anyone who goes through the arduous process of writing a piece to try and convey something (be it insipid, banal & trashy) is more worthy of respect than just about any mainstream pop product. I think he's genuine and likes what he writes/vice versa. And being influenced by pop aesthetics is not the same as being nut and bolt in the machinery of this shit-factory (music industry, namely). Don't get me wrong, I would never buy an Adams CD
GreggaryPeccary 2 years ago 3
Touché, I see where you're coming from. I agree if he's specifically targeting modern, mainstream Britney-pop
flammesombres 2 years ago
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GreggaryPeccary 2 years ago
"Popular culture" and "high art" are just semantics. Mozart was pop, so was Wagner. The world is different now, these terms mean little anymore. Miles Davis, Frank Zappa and Squarepusher are examples of inspiring composers that embrace our age and could be defined as either pop or high art; who cares? The problem with modern 'classical' music is for many people it's quite uninspiring and caught in a retrospective web. People don't need educating as much as those composers have to up their game.
flybynight420 2 years ago 2
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flammesombres 2 years ago
While I can agree with you about modern classical music, you are wrong about the role of the music of Mozart and Wagner during their time. Music back then, in general, was much more serious to the public than pop music is now. The whole concept of pop-culture is not even applicable in the sense that we know it today to those historical times. Pop culture and High art are not semantics. Pop culture is very far beneath high art. You cannot compare the validity of Wagner to the music of Zappa.
jth0134 2 years ago
If you read Mozart's letters he wasn't the most serious of men. He wrote a piece of music called "lick my arse". He filled dance halls just the same way Duke Ellington did, and they wouldn't have been as tame as they are in Hollywood movies. Again I consider the notion of there being two neat catagories that creative works can fall into as being a product of psychology and semantics (reinforced endlessly), rather than having any existence independent of them.
flybynight420 2 years ago
I would tend to agree with you, except your example. I would say that Zappa is an excellent example of crossover between pop culture and high art. On one hand he has songs like "Titties and Beer" and on the other "Weasels Tearing off My Face". The later being a rock equivalent to the music of composers like Penderecki or Ligeti. However, I for one regret this divide between pop culture and high art. Why can't pop culture be sophisticated and why can't high art appeal to the masses?
JosephGlaser 2 years ago
sorry mr. adams. your opera was on TV.
bobmusic00 2 years ago
Barack Obama just invited Brad Paisley to perform at the white house.
So this guy is a prophet
Doctor Atomic is some great music yo.
luv that
mimesis6mime 2 years ago
Perhaps a less controversial argument could be made to make the same point; America may or may not be anti-intellectual but there is certainly a bias against what Adams defines of 'culture' (poetry, classical music etc.). Obviously many viewers disagree with Adams narrow definition that excludes any "popular" influence.
perfectdisguisetay 2 years ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
Psst, hey dude, FYI - "anti-intellectualism" is not the problem... it's that you're a poor, bitter, disgustingly arrogant douchebag who feels disconnected from the rest of your species and appeals to "intelligence" as a way to feel superior over all those kids who bullied you in school. Oh, you're so much more sophisticated than those silly kids out having a good time... you're above all that.
I wouldn't want to know this person in real life. Serious issues, rotten to the core. Poor guy.
AIexandar 2 years ago
classsical was once pop
sipote1994 2 years ago
no it wasn't pop meaning popular keep in mind there were no radios mp3 players vinyls any recorded music so where did people get to hear this music .
murtsworld666 2 years ago
in a sense I agree with you "murtsworld", but in a sense I agree with "sipote." It was not as mass-produced and distributed as today, but many of the older pieces we call "classics" *were* in fact the anachronistic equivalent of what we might call "pop" today. In a way it's comparing apples and oranges- but I think there r dangers in ignoring both similarities and differences....
composerdoh 2 years ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
Why is this elitist crap so highly rated?
funkalunatic 2 years ago
Why is your imbecilic crap so highly rated?
GreggaryPeccary 2 years ago
Give example of intellectual pop culture.
Mastikator 2 years ago
Gershwin was one of the foremost pop composers of his day. I suppose film scores would be considered pop culture given their association with films, and of the composers active in recent years, I dare you to find a better technician than Jerry Goldsmith or John Williams.
GlobalHuntMan 2 years ago
Classical = Generic term for styles that grew out of fashion. Maybe good (see Guillaume de Machaut) but is generally garbage.
Pop = Generic term which basically could be any genre which is relatively new and enjoyed by a large number of people. 99% garbage.
Music = Not pop or classical, but generally new underground stuff that isn't complete shit and therefore isn't enjoyed by the vast majority of humans.
studio7manga 2 years ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
"Pop" music isn't glorified, it's just a commonly popular form of music; it speaks to the majority of people. Classical does not.
Political parties use pop music in campaign's as feel-good jingles. It's not a personal statement of music preference! That's just stupid.
Dude's just airing his jealousy.
Classical is dead. Boo-hoo.
glenbruce 2 years ago
It's more than a bifurcation; It's a split like a particle accelerator snapshot.
1RadicalOne 2 years ago
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Antarblue 2 years ago 6
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perfectdisguisetay 2 years ago
@Antarblue I agree, Antarblue. But high culture plays an important role in society, which relates to values cherished by the intelectual elite, such as rigor, calculated variation of tradition and reinterpretation of the canon. Then, 19th century's "axiology" is not a problem, it's a way to glorify specific works of art and artists beyond the pure financial perspective. We can blame the Aesthetics or French Revolution; this will not change the strength of high culture.
rmelofranco 1 year ago
@Antarblue
Keep telling yourself that. This is not what the discussion is about however. It's about people who love and, perform and study the classics being treated like pariahs in US mainstream society. I highly recommend "The Age of American Unreason" by Susan Jacoby on the subject.
baracine 1 year ago
@Antarblue Doesn't mean that pop culture is equally valid as classical music is. That's relativist bile. Not all arts or cultures are equal.
RogueRotting360 1 year ago
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Antarblue 1 year ago
@Antarblue 1. by what standard?
"2. from a social science point of view there is no judging whether music cultures are high or low or have artistic merit. It's about how culture functions in society. The judgements are made by the members of the culture."
"3, 'pop' and 'classical' are 20th terms that reflect class struggle. Beethoven and Strauss were the pop music of their times."
Marxist social science bollocks.
Who said I was coming from a social science perspective?
RogueRotting360 1 year ago
@Antarblue Classical music, is defined by the complexity and craft behind the composition and performances, not how popular or esoteric it is. It is down to the very structure of the music, and the guile behind its creation, not the public's love or rejection of it.
RogueRotting360 1 year ago
Not true. I'm from the academe. Music in the academe in the European art music tradition is decided by money and cronyism.
Antarblue 1 year ago