Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by WhompingWindows on Friday January 11, 2019 @09:05PM
(#18889054)
I love the mixture of pentatonic, modal, tonal, and atonal in the works of Debussy. He toes the line of modernity with wit, charm, and absolute beauty. For wit, check out Gradus ad Parnassum, a super bouncy piece in a beginner-friendly key. For charm, go with Arabesque No 1. Absolute beauty lies in store in Claire de Lune, yes, but also in The Sunken Cathedral, in the string quartet, and in the vocal music. He has astonishing creativity, look at his Preludes, his opera, or his Afternoon of a Faun for that, wow, sheer creativity.
Debussy (or perhaps Ravel) may be the one composer who most successfully commanded the widest range of tonal devices, before the modernists like Stravinsky and Schoenberg pushed tonality to its breaking point/broke it. Debussy was not the only innovator, as we saw innovation and creativity from Bach to Mozart, Debussy to Chopin, however I'd argue Debussy was the true bridge into modernity.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by ssmmww on Friday January 11, 2019 @10:51PM
(#18889509)
To my not-very-well-trained ear, almost all composers before Debussy sound a little dated, corny, and constrained, and most composers after him - Bartok and Messiaen being important exceptions! - sound abstract and unmusical.
Debussy's music is at this equilibrium point where the harmonic language is complex and atonal enough to evoke a spectrum of iridescent colours and haunting, ambiguous moods inaccessible to traditional common-practice harmony, but just constrained enough to avoid the descent into hostility and noise.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by 3131s on Saturday January 12, 2019 @02:44AM
(#18890215)
As someone who also enjoys music in this vein, I'd recommend trying Ravel, Mompou, Janáček, Satie, Delius, Busoni, Milhaud, Fauré, Schubert, Liszt, Domeniconi, Sibelius, Ligeti, Messiaen, Xenakis, Martinů, and Scriabin among others I'm forgetting (in roughly decreasing order of likeness). Like you I don't get much out of most earlier classical music, with the major exception of Bach, or out of totally atonal stuff either.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by Doctor_Fegg on Saturday January 12, 2019 @04:05AM
(#18890394)
20th century church music is worth exploring, too, whatever your faith or none. If you enjoy Fauré you should try Duruflé, and from there perhaps Howells.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by rectang on Saturday January 12, 2019 @03:03AM
(#18890249)
The one I feel like I'm missing the most from is Mozart. To me Mozart sounds so trite, mannered, frilly, wimpy and boring. "Deeeeeee deedlee dee dee dee dee deeeee dee..."
FWIW, my favorite Beethoven pieces are the ones that sound the least classical in harmonic language -- especially the Waldstein Sonata and Sonatas 30-32.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by becga on Monday January 14, 2019 @09:34PM
(#18908449)
Mozart can be hard to get. It's been said he was primarily a composer for voice no matter the instrument he composed for. His slow pieces are the most otherwordly.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by vfinn on Saturday January 12, 2019 @02:23AM
(#18890161)
I don't know. As a hobby composer this sounds so wrong. All compositions are restricted more or less. What's missing from Beethoven's 5th? Corny? outdated? What's missing from Vivaldi's pure childlike harmony? Chopin's nocturnes? Bach's complex counterpoint in the Art of Fugue?! Different eras are just... different, but like different flowers, or a glass of water to beer, not one above all else. This might sound corny.
They say Schoenberg pushed tonality to its limits, but to me there's so much ground to be explored harmonically and rhythmically way past Debussy and others, and way past tonality in general. How's abstract not musical? Think of extending Bach's complex counterpoint with AI; think of moving away from discreteness; think of adding technical extensions to every instrument of the orchestra in order to create new possibilities of sound; think of going past the 12 notes. Looking at it this way, Debussy is also very restricted in terms of depth and in terms of notes on and between the lines.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by yesenadam on Saturday January 12, 2019 @03:57AM
(#18890376)
Someone modestly shares with you their musical tastes - To my not-very-well-trained ear - and you tell them what they say 'sounds so wrong'?! I don't think tastes can be 'wrong'. You sound like you think your tastes are reasonable and no-one else's are.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by vfinn on Saturday January 12, 2019 @07:31AM
(#18890908)
Hmm, it did occur to me that that phrasing could sound harsh to someone, but I didn't mean to belittle his/her opinion.
Sorry about that. I tend to talk quite bluntly (as a Finn).
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by ternaryoperator on Sunday January 13, 2019 @11:53PM
(#18900762)
I find Osetinskaya plays so fast that it's difficult to make out the counterpoint. Have a look/listen at Glenn Gould's version, which makes the counterpoint really clear [1]. As you might know, this interpretation was controversial at the time.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by vfinn on Tuesday January 15, 2019 @05:14AM
(#18910077)
I know Gould (of course) and the piece, he's awesome. Still, I found Osetinskaya's play very precise, delightful, and full of emotion. I did not have any trouble with the speed. One day I prefer Gould, the other this one. It's just like that.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by ternaryoperator on Tuesday January 15, 2019 @09:28PM
(#18917806)
> One day I prefer Gould, the other this one. It's just like that.
Amen to that! I frequently rediscover interpretations upon hearing them anew, which makes me go back and listen to other versions of the same piece again. It's what I love about classical music.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by yesenadam on Saturday January 12, 2019 @09:15AM
(#18891231)
Don't be snarky.
It seems you assumed I'm the person he was replying to - I said nothing close to or even in the ballpark of 'eras are better than one another'. Every sentence of your comment was unacceptably condescending. Don't tell people on here to "relax". Or that their comments aren't interesting - just don't reply if that's the case. Thanks.
Re:Debussy’s Radical Search for Simplicity
by yesenadam on Saturday January 12, 2019 @01:09AM
(#18889971)
Apparently those (jazz) guys called the 4ths voicings like in So What 'Ravel chords'. And the (Peace Piece-derived) Flamenco Sketches I can't help but think owes something to the first movement of Mahler's 9th, which even has the 'down a major 3rd' progression. (C -> Ab in F.S., D -> Bb in the Mahler)
..Speaking of which, I didn't learn until recently that James Brown stole the 'booo-dap' riff from So What for (maybe his greatest song), Cold Sweat. Apparently he wanted a song with horns going 'booo-dap' just like So What..it's even in the same key, almost the same voicing.
Debussy (or perhaps Ravel) may be the one composer who most successfully commanded the widest range of tonal devices, before the modernists like Stravinsky and Schoenberg pushed tonality to its breaking point/broke it. Debussy was not the only innovator, as we saw innovation and creativity from Bach to Mozart, Debussy to Chopin, however I'd argue Debussy was the true bridge into modernity.
Debussy harmonic analysis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbjWgfNoO2U
Debussy's music is at this equilibrium point where the harmonic language is complex and atonal enough to evoke a spectrum of iridescent colours and haunting, ambiguous moods inaccessible to traditional common-practice harmony, but just constrained enough to avoid the descent into hostility and noise.
FWIW, my favorite Beethoven pieces are the ones that sound the least classical in harmonic language -- especially the Waldstein Sonata and Sonatas 30-32.
They say Schoenberg pushed tonality to its limits, but to me there's so much ground to be explored harmonically and rhythmically way past Debussy and others, and way past tonality in general. How's abstract not musical? Think of extending Bach's complex counterpoint with AI; think of moving away from discreteness; think of adding technical extensions to every instrument of the orchestra in order to create new possibilities of sound; think of going past the 12 notes. Looking at it this way, Debussy is also very restricted in terms of depth and in terms of notes on and between the lines.
1) Bach - Passacaglia & Fugue In C Minor - BWV 582 by Karl Richter https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_W4PJUOeVYw
2) Vivaldi - Stabat Mater https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGwvKU4_vaw
3) Bach - Piano Concerto in D Min. BWV 1052 by Polina Osetinskaya https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osg_WmeLxQk
[1] https://youtu.be/9ZX_XCYokQo?t=307
Funny side note: Do you know Gould's So You Want to Write a Fugue? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHW1I8T0caI
Amen to that! I frequently rediscover interpretations upon hearing them anew, which makes me go back and listen to other versions of the same piece again. It's what I love about classical music.
I do indeed known Gould's very clever fugue.
It seems you assumed I'm the person he was replying to - I said nothing close to or even in the ballpark of 'eras are better than one another'. Every sentence of your comment was unacceptably condescending. Don't tell people on here to "relax". Or that their comments aren't interesting - just don't reply if that's the case. Thanks.
> It seems you assumed I'm the person he was replying to
What are you talking about? He couldn't have been replying to you, because your comments were not in the ancestry of his.
> I said nothing close to or even in the ballpark of 'eras are better than one another'
You derived from my comment meaning opposite from what was plainly written?! Read more carefully.
> Every sentence of your comment was unacceptably condescending
Every sentence of yours to him was unacceptably rude.
> Don't tell people on here to "relax". Or that their comments aren't interesting - just don't reply if that's the case. Thanks.
Don't tell people on here that they sound like they think they're the only reasonable one. Just don't reply if that's the case. Thanks.
I also feel like there's a similar sweet spot for Jazz in the early 1960s.
However, I suspect this conviction has more to do with personal taste than with absolute realities.
I don't find Shostakovich abstract or unmusical. Possibly an additional exception?
..Speaking of which, I didn't learn until recently that James Brown stole the 'booo-dap' riff from So What for (maybe his greatest song), Cold Sweat. Apparently he wanted a song with horns going 'booo-dap' just like So What..it's even in the same key, almost the same voicing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6WXzOIsBuQ