I think Feldman is an incredible conversationalist but he's not a good philosopher, let's say. The air of sophistication he exudes only goes so far. He hides what are essentially just opinions behind a dogmatic essentialism, e.g.: an American composer is x, a European composer is y etc., but he can't really articulate what that means beyond some vague notion of historical consciousness. It strikes me that his sense of things is simply what he would prefer to be true, rather than an attempt to get at let's say a real phenomenological view of music, composition, performance, listening etc. So when it comes to Bartók, who the hell knows? He's just saying he doesn't like Bartók that much but he won't say why because he'll have to admit that his criteria are founded more or less upon the same "style barriers" that he criticises others for not being able to overcome.
Bravo! (…but shouldn’t the “Christian” chorale melody still sing with quasi “Legato” beauty and at least pretend to not be affected by the “heathenish” 16th notes running around?)
I downloaded the channel with yt-dlp using TheFrenchGhosty's script collection. You never know if Google will delete his account for inactivity if no one is taking care of his account. R.I.P.
Sorry, but I completely disagree with you. I am a concert pianist myself and before big concerts I always come and play for him. He always encourages me to find my own ways and never forces me to do anything that is not natural for me . He always gives me incredibly valuable information to express my own ideas. I am very grateful for each lesson I have with him even though I have never studied with him as his official student. He always inspires me to push myself hard to find new colors and approaches to music. Besides that, he is a very kind man and I will always be grateful for the things he has done to me. He has helped a lot careerwise.
This is a very strange 'gesprek'. Between 1984 and 1986 I took pretty much every opportunity to hear Feldman and I listened to him for hours and days on end. He never made dubious statements like 'Boulez took the sauerkraut out of Webern' (Webern was Viennese and--unlike all those Germans like Hindemith or Stockhausen--had absolutely no sauerkraut in his music at all, maybe a little kren...). Also the 'slumming down' of 'white' jazz musicians (when little Benny Goodman came to hear Jimmy Noone, that was a posh world he encountered compared to his). Surly it doesn't help that that ill-clad other gentleman keeps interrupting to go on extended unintelligible ruminations, but I still wonder what strange mood prevailed there. Was Feldman already incapacitated by his fatal illness?
I think that what bothers me most about morton feldman is that he was far too greatly impressed with himself. I rather like some of his music, but to me he was an amateur with a smattering of talent. In the company of other composers, whether it was xenakis or carter, for example, he fails to realize that he’s just not in their league.
You are quite wrong, I think. He and Xenakis were is some sense both naives, their work sometimes dismissed by more academically trained composers who did not respect their extraordinary independence. Carter and Feldman, though stylistically opposite were both iconoclasts. Feldman always sounds like music. Carter and Xenakis rather push that boundary, in my opinion.
That's exactly how composers like Cage or Feldman were perceived during their lives - amateurs with zero ability to compose "proper, serious, academic music". The only strange thing here is that you still think the same way in 2021. In his book Morton touches upon this exact subject. He was never impressed with himself (a Kierkegaard believer), being just a very talkative person.
