Its all either rather tastelessly ugly, silly, trivial or banal. Academia is so full of stupidity because slightly educated idiots think that anything with an 'idea' attached must be valuable. Many academics are nothing but bookish simpletons.
What a labor of love. Thank you for producing this! I always found Ives a bit puzzling, but after watching this in tiny bits over the past couple of weeks and listening to his works mentioned in this documentary, I've come to enjoy many of them. Cheers
People writing music for no other reason than to announce their superiority to the hoi polloi. If you don’t like my “music,” you shouldn’t be allowed to live.
My late friend Chris and I read on the bus heading for college in 1976 that Imogen Holst had nixed "The Planets". We pooled our small change and bought the last vinyl copy in the shop on the way home that day before they were removed from shelves nationwide. On the flip of a coin, Chris got to keep the vinyl copy and I took a cassette copy on my Mum's hi-fi! Happy days.
Am I mistaken or is a minor triad formed between the 6th, 7th, and 9th partials? It would technically be termed a septimal subminor triad I think because the third is flat by about thirty cents but still. Also I think there’s a much closer one higher up-16:19:24. The 19th harmonic is only a couple of cents flat of a 12tet minor third I’m pretty sure
Don't forget the camp favorite: I wear my pink pajamas in the summer when its hot. I wear my flannel nightie in the winter when its not. And sometimes in the spring And sometimes in the fall I jump between the sheets with NOTHING ON AT ALL!!! Glory glory hallelujah Glory glory, what's it to ya? Balmy breezes blow right through ya' WITH NOTHING ON AT ALL
As they say in the business world. The best way to start your own business is create one from within a business has already thriving. From there your own, natural uniqueness will make your business different than anything that’s ever been done before, because you are different than any person has ever been born before.
Read Cosima Wagner’s fascinating and voluminous diaries. She sadistically abused their son Siegfried; was more anti-Semitic than Wagner, and expressed her bigotry, racism, and Nazism openly until her death in 1930; and was the original despicable Wagnerian fanatic. She even abandoned her father Frantz Liszt in his prolonged death agony to fuss over Bayreuth.
Really great summary. I learned this stuff 30 years ago, and did some work building on it at the time. Agree with you that the IC vector is the most useful part of it all - especially ic5 and ic6, since all commonly used scales can be derived from some combination of ic5 and ic6 intervals. Love your channel!
It is so pretentious to talk about "fractal music" and that wuorinen said he had been "writing fractal music for years". I am a professional mathematician and amateur musician and what wuorinen said is nonsense..
Rameau/Riemann theory was always broken. There is no such thing as chord "root", that's just a fantasy of dilettantes who took music courses at fancy universities. Practical musicians like Bach didn't care about such theorizing.
I’m curious regarding the Commando March: given that the sort of tone synthesizer voice Barber wanted to use but couldn’t, is now extremely accessible and reliable in a live setting, has there been performances done (recorded hopefully) of the March with the “clarinet” part being performed on a synthesizer as Barber originally intended?
The synthesizer was in the Second Symphony. I don't think it's common, as almost all Barber pieces that are done are revised versions. Plus, I think most orchestras are more comfortable entrusting the part to a clarinetist.
Sitting here with my pitch meter. The gongs at 9:20 are tuned to A444hz Shumann Resonance, Earth's relative atmospheric frequency, not standard A440hz. Sorry, Adam Neely.
Excellent video and discussion. I understand that this "impossibly complex" notation means no two performances will ever be the same but my view is 1) So what, why does this even matter...and 2) More conventional notation achieves the same thing anyway. That doesn't mean I don't like some of the New Complexity composers - I find Finnissy's music intriguing and psychologically compelling, whereas I simply cannot abide Ferneyhough.
I've just subscribed to your channel. Alas, I cannot lend any financial support because I'm in receipt of a disability allowance and thus not in a position to render that kind of assistance. Oh yes, by the way: in one of your early videos you played us the 1st movement of your symphony. Have any other parts been recorded yet?
Commenting and sharing the content also helps, so please to on whatever platforms are at your disposal! Only the first movement has ever been done, and frankly, it's the only movement in any _shape_ to be done. That was a sophomore-year-of-college project and the further away I get from that time, the more I regard it as juvenilia. I looked at the sketches of the other movements a few weeks ago, and they are painfully bad in execution even if the concepts are okay. So it would take an orchestra to show any interest for me to put in the time to effectively recompose much of the piece.
I am intrigued that your Samuel Barber video garnered 26 comments (including my own) while this one received 101 (including my own), particularly since Barber's music is superficially more accessible to the majority of the public. I suspect most of your core audience, however, are not frightened of such people as Ives, Xenakis and Wuorinen. This video proved a revelation to me because while I am acquainted with most of the major 20th composers and familiar with quite a few of the more obscure chaps and chappesses, somehow Wuorinen managed to sneak under my radar. I was vaguely aware of Time's Encomium...and that's all. The Microsymphony and Genesis definitely merit my attention but I shall spend a few days checking out his other works since clearly there is a significant gap in my musical knowledge and experience which requires attention. America damned well ought to be regarded (with reference to classical music) as of equal importance to Europe, especially since it did not have the benefit of renaissance and baroque periods upon which to evolve its language. Its composers and performers 'caught up' with us Europeans very quickly and by the mid 20th century (in my probably biased opinion) it merited the respect and approbation formerly awarded only to 'the great European tradition'. To date, Charles Ives remains my favourite American composer but Carl Ruggles, Leonard Bernstein and Elliott Carter are not far behind. I could add Edgar Varese, perhaps, although I still think of him as French. Anyway, THANK YOU for introducing me to the work of this intriguing fellow, especially as his views on the removal of government institutions from the arts and education concur with my own; yes, I'm a republican / libertarian / conservative of the Ben Shapiro school and proud of it!
Isn't it wretched? You wait 3 months for a new Classical Nerd video then 4 come along at once. Seriously, though, I realise ho9w much time, energy and effort are required to produce a 60+ minute video and your programme on Charles Ives is (so far) my favourite Classical Nerd video. I am mightily impressed by your informative presentation of William Grant Still, Charles Wuorinen and this much maligned chap. I admit I am not a fan of Barber's music but its quality cannot be denied. It intrigues me, however, that in a 1 hour18 minute programme you never mentioned his Violin Concerto which I thought was one of his major works - perhaps I'm wrong about that. The only Barber works I'd heard prior to your video were Knoxville 1915, School For Scandal and that famous Adagio (in the string orchestra version). Based on the brief extracts featured, I shall certainly investigate the Flight Symphony and Prayer For Kierkegard so THANK YOU for introducing me to those pieces.
Well, a little over an hour isn't enough to talk about every single piece. What I usually do or don't mention in a video has a lot to do with the flow of the script rather than striving for completeness. In this case, almost none of the concertos really made it in-neither did his early piano _Essays_ or the song-cycle _Despite and Still._
